Two more turn hostile in Sohrabuddin case

Mumbai: Two more witnesses turned hostile in the Sohrabuddin Sheikh fake encounter case on Tuesday. With this, the count of hostile witnesses has reached 47, with as many as 65 witnesses having been examined during trial.

One of the prosecution witnesses, Mohamad Naimuddin, who works with Khaja Travels, Hyderabad, told the police in February 2010 that he had picked up five passengers, including a woman, on November 22, 2005, and made them board a luxury bus for which they had booked tickets. Later, when Mr Naimuddin was shown six photographs, he identified one of them as Sohrabuddin. He could not identify the photograph of the burka-clad woman but he was able to identify the picture of the man accompanying her.

According to the prosecution, the accused (ATS Gujarat), abducted Sohrabuddin, his wife Kausar Bi, and his accomplice Tulsiram Prajapati, from the said bus when they were travelling from Hyderabad to Sangli in Maharashtra. After being kidnapped, the trio was illegally detained and later killed.

However, after stepping into the witness box on Tuesday, Mr Naimuddin did not stand by his police statement, after which, upon public prosecutor, B.P. Raju’s request, judge S.J. Sharma declared Mr Naimuddin hostile.

Another witness, Shilpan Sinh, was also declared hostile. According to the prosecution, he was a panch witness before whom the signature of one of the accused was taken. On Tuesday however, Mr Sinh told the court that he had not witnessed any such thing.