After the defence lawyer rang the curtain down on the courtroom drama through his final arguments in the 2002 hit-and-run re-trial of Bollywood actor Salman Khan, Additional Sessions Judge DW Deshpande said on Monday that he would fix the date of verdict in the case on Tuesday. The judge, who was to have fixed the date of judgement in the hit-and-run case on Monday, deferred his announcement to Tuesday.
While concluding his final arguments in the much-discussed case, Salman’s lawyer Shrikant Shivade asked the court not to accept the evidence of Ravindra Patil, the actor’s police bodyguard on the ground that the eyewitness and complainant in the case (Patil) was not available for cross-examination.
However, Special Public Prosecutor Pradeep Gharat opposed Shivade’s contention by saying that the defence lawyer had been given enough opportunity to cross-question Patil, who is both the eye-witness and complainant in the case.
Ravindra Patil, the actor’s police bodyguard had died of acute bilateral tuberculosis, at a city civic TB hospital on October 3, 2007, midway through the original trial. During the original trial, Patil had deposed before a Magistrate, saying that that he had warned Salman not to drive rashly or else he would meet with an accident but the actor did not heed to his advice.
The defence lawyer had on Saturday urged the trial court to discard the evidence of Patil on the ground that the latter had kept quiet when the police visited the mishap site on the night of September 28, 2002 on the circumstances leading to the incident.
Questioning Patil’s silence after the mishap, Shivade had argued, “Patil lodged a complaint with the Bandra police later. He also made a supplementary statement also...Patil alleged that Khan was under the influence of liquor and was driving the car. Being a policeman, he knew that drunken driving was a serious offence. Why did he not disclose to police the actor’s role when they first inquired about the mishapIJ”.
“In view of the aggravated charge of culpable homicide not amounting to murder being added, prejudice was caused to the defence because Patil is no longer available for cross-examination,” the defence lawyer had told the court.
The Prosecution’s case is that Salman — allegedly in a drunken state — had on the night of September 28, 2002, rammed his Toyota land Cruiser lexus into the American Express Bakery and laundry at Bandra (west) killing one person and injuring four others.
During the course of the actor’s re-trial in the 2002, the Prosecution examined 27 witnesses, while the defence examined only one witness – the actor’s driver Ashok Singh.
In addition, the trial court recorded accused actor’s statement under Section 313 of the CrPC. In his statement before the court, Salman claimed that it was not he but his driver Ashok Singh who was behind the wheels at the time of mishap, a claim that found corroboration in the deposition made subsequently by Singh in his capacity as the defence witness.
Forty-nine-year-old Salman is facing a re-trial in the hit-and-run case before the city sessions court for an aggravated charge of culpable homicide not amounting to murder (section 304 (ii) of IPC) invoked against him midway through the earlier trial on December 5, 2013.
(Fresh charges were framed against the actor in the court of judge U B Hejib on July 24 last year).