Malegaon blast: Statements of two officers not recorded due to technical issue

The statements of two officers was to be recorded in the Malegaon 2008 blasts case on Saturday but due to some legaltechnical issue they could not be recordedThe said retired NIA officer had earlier recorded a few statements when the case was transferred to NIA from Maharashtra ATS and on Saturday he was supposed to record a fresh statement in the caseHowever as all the witnesses reiterated their statements in court the officer was not needed to be crossexamined and the witness was dropped on Saturday without his statement being recordedThe retired NIA officer did not turn hostile but was dropped as a witness as he was not deemed relevant in the trial anymore His statements during the investigation are affirmed in the trial by the witnesses concernedAccording to the prosecution another witness who was an ATS officer could not depose on Saturday because of some technical issue He will be called to record his statement on some other dateOn September 29 2008 six people were killed and over 100 others injured after an explosive device placed on a motorcycle exploded in Maharashtras Malegaon city in Nashik townEarlier on April 10 a Special NIA court issued a bailable warrant of Rs10000 against an ATS officer for repeatedly not appearing to record his statement in the Malegaon 2008 blasts case trialAlso Read Total collapse of law and order Mamata after Atiq Ahmed Ashraf shot deadThe said officer was part of the initial investigation team of the ATS and had recorded statements of several witnesses of the caseHe was ordered to remain present in court and record his statement on May 2Earlier in March the Supreme Court rejected Lt Col Prasad Purohits petition challenging the Bombay High Court order dismissing his petition seeking to discharge him in the Malegaon 2008 blast case on the grounds of lack of sanction under section 1972 of the CrPC from the Indian Army to prosecute him in the caseThe top court had noted that the challenge is to the order of the High Court whereby it was observed that sanction is not needed under section 1972 of the CrPC for the prosecution of the petitioner as his impugned conduct does not pertain to any of his official dutiesHaving noted the basis of the impugned judgment we see no reason to interfere with the same and accordingly the Special Leave Petition is not entertained the court had saidOn October 23 2008 the Maharashtra ATS made its first arrest in connection to the case by apprehending BJP MP Sadhvi Pragya Singh ThakurLater the other accused including Sameer Kulkarni retired Major Ramesh Upadhyay Sudhakar Chaturvedi Ajay Rahilkar and Sudhakar Chaturvedi were also arrested in connection with the caseOn January 20 2009 the ATS filed a chargesheet in the case after completing its investigationIn April 2011 the central government transferred the investigation in the case to the NIAThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever