HJS defended Kadam after Ramabai verdict
Three days after Mirror revealed the involvement of former SRPF sub-inspector Manohar Kadam -- convicted of ordering the 1997 Ramabai shooting that killed 10 -- in the murder of rationalist Narendra Dabholkar, it has emerged that the Hindu Janajagruti Samiti (HJS) had jumped to Kadam’s defence and filed complaints after his conviction in the aforementioned case in 2009, thereby implying that the two parties had a prevailing relationship.
Kadam, who was convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment in 2009 but has been out on bail since after the Bombay High Court suspended his sentence, exchanged multiple calls with Dabholkar murder suspect and HJS member Virendrasinh Tawde in 2012 and 2013 before the rationalist was shot dead on August 20, 2013. Tawde is the first to be arrested in the Dabholkar murder case.
Kadam, in 1997, had ordered the police to open fire at a rioting crowd at Ghatkopar’s Ramabai Nagar, which left 10 dead and 30 injured. In 2009, Justice SY Kulkarni of the Bombay High Court had sentenced Kadam to life imprisonment. HJS’s Committee to Prevent Judicial Injustice (CPJI) had quickly jumped to Kadam’s defence by filing a complaint against Justice Kulkarni.
In his complaint, he had alleged that ‘it was mandatory under Clause 363 (1) of CrPC that the judge gives a copy of the sentence to the accused but Police Sub-Inspector Manohar Kadam, an accused in the police-firing case at Ramabai Ambedkarnagar, was not given such a copy; so he could not appeal to the High Court for a bail’.
Kadam had reportedly applied for bail in the High Court the following day but the judges were not able to take a call due to the absence of a copy of the verdict from Kulkarni. “It is mandatory to give a copy while passing the verdict, without charging anything from the accused,” Vatkar had said in his complaint, which sought a departmental enquiry against Kulkarni.
Kadam is yet to be examined by the CBI, which has mentioned his name in the remand application submitted to the special CBI court in Pune. But apart from his alleged involvement in training Dabholkar’s shooters, officers of the investigating agency also suspect that Kadam provided the ultra-right wing outfit with weaponry used in the murder.
The bullets used in the murders of Dabholkar, Govind Pansare and MM Kalburgi bear the name of Pune’s Khadki ammunition factory. The CBI is pushing for the shells and bullets to be sent to Scotland Yard for a ballistic evaluation, but the Karnataka government is yet to give a nod for the same.
Kadam, who was convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment in 2009 but has been out on bail since after the Bombay High Court suspended his sentence, exchanged multiple calls with Dabholkar murder suspect and HJS member Virendrasinh Tawde in 2012 and 2013 before the rationalist was shot dead on August 20, 2013. Tawde is the first to be arrested in the Dabholkar murder case.
Kadam, in 1997, had ordered the police to open fire at a rioting crowd at Ghatkopar’s Ramabai Nagar, which left 10 dead and 30 injured. In 2009, Justice SY Kulkarni of the Bombay High Court had sentenced Kadam to life imprisonment. HJS’s Committee to Prevent Judicial Injustice (CPJI) had quickly jumped to Kadam’s defence by filing a complaint against Justice Kulkarni.
The coordinator of CPJI, Shivaji Vatkar, filed the complaint addressed to Radhakrishna Vikhe-Patil, state minister for Law; and Chief Justice of Bombay High Court, Swatantra Kumar, in May 2009. Vatkar had alleged in the complaint that Kulkarni had not adhered to the clauses of the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC), by not giving a copy of the sentence to the accused Kadam.
In his complaint, he had alleged that ‘it was mandatory under Clause 363 (1) of CrPC that the judge gives a copy of the sentence to the accused but Police Sub-Inspector Manohar Kadam, an accused in the police-firing case at Ramabai Ambedkarnagar, was not given such a copy; so he could not appeal to the High Court for a bail’.
Kadam had reportedly applied for bail in the High Court the following day but the judges were not able to take a call due to the absence of a copy of the verdict from Kulkarni. “It is mandatory to give a copy while passing the verdict, without charging anything from the accused,” Vatkar had said in his complaint, which sought a departmental enquiry against Kulkarni.
Kadam is yet to be examined by the CBI, which has mentioned his name in the remand application submitted to the special CBI court in Pune. But apart from his alleged involvement in training Dabholkar’s shooters, officers of the investigating agency also suspect that Kadam provided the ultra-right wing outfit with weaponry used in the murder.
The bullets used in the murders of Dabholkar, Govind Pansare and MM Kalburgi bear the name of Pune’s Khadki ammunition factory. The CBI is pushing for the shells and bullets to be sent to Scotland Yard for a ballistic evaluation, but the Karnataka government is yet to give a nod for the same.
