A key accused in the murder of Dr Narendra Dabholkar, Dr Virendrasing Tawade of Sanatan Sanstha, got directions from a spokesperson of the radical outfit Hindu Janajagruti Samiti (HJS), to “leave all other work” and “concentrate on the anti-superstition bill 2005”, the CBI officer who investigated the case, S R Singh, told a special court in Pune on Tuesday.
Founder of the Maharashtra Andhashraddha Nirmulan Samiti (ANIS), Dabholkar had championed the bill against superstition for years. He was shot dead on the VR Shinde Bridge in Pune on August 20, 2013, when he was out on a morning walk. The case was taken over by CBI in 2014 after directions from the Bombay High Court.
Singh, who has now retired, on Tuesday deposed as a witness before special judge SR Navandar for Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA) cases. The officer, who retired in December 2022, will be examined again on Wednesday. His chief examination was recorded by special public prosecutor Prakash Suryawanshi.
Under his supervision, Singh said, a search was conducted at Tawade’s home at “Sanatan Sankul” at Devad, Panvel, on June 10, 2016, and “incriminating documents were seized”.
“Same day, we visited Sanatan Sanstha Ashram in Panvel. We seized a hard disc from the computer used by Sanatan Sanstha members…Tawade accompanied us to the CBI’s office in Belapur, Navi Mumbai. Here, in the presence of witnesses, Tawade’s emails were accessed…Prints of certain emails were taken out…There was one email from Durgesh Samant, the national spokesperson of HJS, giving directions to Tawade to concentrate on the anti-superstition bill 2005 and leave all other work of HJS..Tawade was arrested the same day,” Singh said.
Singh also told the court that the then deputy superintendent of police – DS Chauhan of CBI-SCB (special crime branch) – was the investigation officer (IO) of this case from June 2, 2014, to August 3, 2015. After Chauhan was transferred to Chennai, Singh took charge as the IO.
On March 8, 2016, he recalled, he examined a witness – Sanjay Sadvilkar of Kolhapur – whose statement was recorded before a magistrate court on March 22, 2016. The 54-year-old Kolhapur-based artisan and Hindutva activist is also a key witness in the Govind Pansare murder case.
Like Dabholkar, veteran Communist leader Pansare was shot dead in Kolhapur during a morning walk with his wife Uma on February 16, 2015.
After Sadvilkar’s statement, CBI arrested Tawade in the Dabholkar case on June 10, 2016.
The CBI chargesheet against Tawde, filed on September 8, 2016, stated the investigation has established through oral and documentary evidence that Tawade, who harbored enmity with Dabholkar “owing to the ideological differences between ANIS and Sanatan Sanstha, criminally conspired with Vinay Pawar and Sarang Akolkar and others to murder Dr. Dabholkar. In pursuance of the said criminal conspiracy, Vinay Pawar and Sarang Akolkar shot dead Dr. Dabholkar on August 20, 2013, at about 7.25 am in Pune.”
It also claimed Tawade and Akolkar had a meeting with Sadvilkar in 2013. Tawade, it further added, wanted to manufacture weapons with Sadvilkar’s help, and “Akolkar had, for this purpose, brought samples of a country-made pistol and a country-made revolver of high quality”.
But questions were raised about the CBI probe and Sadvilkar after the agency contradicted its claim and named Hindutva activists Sachin Prakashrao Andure and Sharad Kalaskar, arrested in August 2018, as the two shooters who had opened fire at Dabholkar.
Andure’s name had cropped up during the interrogation of three Hindutva activists Vaibhav Raut, Sharad Kalaskar, and Sudhanva Gondhalekar. They were arrested by the Maharashtra ATS on August 10, 2018, in the Nalasopara arms haul case as clues were obtained from the Karnataka Police probe into the Gauri Lankesh murder case.
Headed by SR Singh, the CBI team then arrested Andure and Kalaskar and filed a chargesheet against them. The CBI also arrested Mumbai-based lawyer Sanjeev Punalekar and his aide Vikram Bhave in November 2019 for their alleged involvement in Dabholkar’s murder. Both of them, said to be linked to Sanatan Sanstha, are out on bail.
Tawade, Andure, Kalaskar, and Bhave are charged with murder, and conspiracy to commit murder under sections of the Indian Penal Code, Section 16 of the UAPA pertaining to terrorist acts, and provisions of the Arms Act. Punalekar is charged with the destruction of evidence in the case. All five accused have pleaded not guilty to the charges.
Meanwhile, the court on Tuesday rejected the plea by defence lawyers to seek inspection of the Malkhana — the complete set of records, documents, and objects with the CBI pertaining to the Dabholkar murder case.
