Malegaon blast: NIA court issues bailable warrant against ATS officer

Mumbai: The special NIA court on Monday issued a bailable warrant against an officer of Maharashtra Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS) for his failure to appear before the court to testify in the September 2008 Malegaon bomb blast case even after repeated summons.

The ATS officer was summoned to appear before the special court on Monday, but did not turn up, claiming that there was a law-and-order situation in the area where he stayed and it was unsafe for him to leave. This was the second time when the officer failed to turn up before the court pursuant to summons issued to him.

The officer was deployed at ATS and was part of the investigating team, which recorded statements of several witnesses during the initial investigation.

The officer would be examined to record his testimony on the investigation carried out by him and would be cross-examined by the lawyers of the accused based on testimonies given by those witnesses whose statements he had recorded.

So far prosecution has examined around 310 witnesses, of which 34 witnesses have been declared hostile. The trial in the case is now at its last stage.

Six people were killed and more than 100 injured on September 29, 2008, after an explosive device strapped to a motorcycle went off near a mosque at Malegaon town in Nashik district, located about 200 kilometres from Mumbai.

BJP Lok Sabha member Pragya Singh Thakur, Lt Col Prasad Purohit, Sudhakar Dwivedi, Major Ramesh Upadhyay (retired), Ajay Rahirkar, Sudhakar Dwivedi, Sudhakar Chaturvedi and Sameer Kulkarni are currently facing trial. All of whom are out on bail.