Mangalore, February 2: The Karnataka High Court on Thursday quashed a six-month-old single-bench order asking the Central Bureau of Investigation to probe into the brutal murder of city based human rights advocate Naushad Kashimji.
The High Court's division bench comprising of Chief Justice Vikramjit Singh, and Justice B V Nagarathna quashed orders of the single bench which after hearing a plea by the widow of the slain advocate directed the CBI to investigate the case and directed the single bench to hear the case afresh.
In fact the division bench had stayed the order of single bench headed by Justice Mohana Shantanagowdar in October 2011. The latest order by the division bench has come as relief to city police, who had appealed against the single bench order.
The Mangalore city police had submitted a memo in the court stating that the police department was able to investigate the case. If the case gets handed over to the CBI, faith on the police department would fade away, it had contended.
Naushad, who was shot dead outside his apartment in Mangalore on Apr 9, 2009, was allegedly warned by four police officers as he was appearing in court defending Rasheed Malbari, the alleged aide of underworld don Chota Shakeel.
Naushad's senior, Purushottam Pujary, had lodged a complaint with Pandeshwar police station accusing the hand of four police officers in the killing of Naushad the same evening after he was allegedly warned by the officers on April 9, 2010.
When the probe did not make a headway, the widow of the victim had filed a writ petition seeking a CBI probe into the matter.
When the matter came up for hearing before single judge bench, the State Government submitted that the CID is already probing into the matter.
However, the petitioner submitted that since there is involvement of four police officers namely police inspector Venkatesh Prasanna, DYSP Jayantha Shetty, Ullal sub-inspector Shivaprakash and Panambur Circle Inspector Valentine D'Souza, she wanted the investigation to be conducted by an independent agency like the CBI.
On July 15, Justice Mohan Shantangowder who heard the matter, had directed the matter be referred to CBI for further investigation.
It was, probably, for the first time in the history of Karnataka, the High Court has decided to handover a murder case to CBI.
It may be recalled that the police had arrested six persons in connection with the murder of advocate within 15 days of the incident. They were Dinesh (24), a resident of Belthangady; Rithesh (20), a resident of Kodikal; Prathap (26), a resident of Kavoor; Ganesh (28) of Kodikal; Subrahmanya (24) of Kadri and Shivaprakash (30) of Urwa Store. The police had also seized three 9 mm pistols, 8 rounds of ammunition, Rs 3,53,060 in cash, three mobile phones, Maruthi 800 car and 4 pistol-magazines.
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