David Coleman Headley on Saturday told the court that LeT chief Hafiz Saeed had told him prior to the Mumbai terror attacks that Shiv Sena chief late Bal Thackeray needed to be taught a lesson.
David Coleman Headley on Saturday told the court that LeT chief Hafiz Saeed had told him prior to the Mumbai terror attacks that Shiv Sena chief late Bal Thackeray needed to be taught a lesson.
Headley further said that he had told Saeed that he could do this job in six months. To accomplish this, he had visited the gate of the late Sena chief’s house and spoke to persons in the security parameter. He had taken a video of Sena Bhavan.
Headley also informed the court that he had not conducted surveillance of Delhi Darbar in Colaba and Israeli consulate in Mumbai. Answering another question, Headley denied that he wanted to establish ‘Islamic rule’ in India.
To a question asked by the defence, he said that his belief was that US, Israel and India were enemies of Islam. However when his statement was read over to him, Headley clarified that he had held this belief in the past.
Before Headley’s testimony could be concluded, Jundal’s lawyer requested special judge G.A. Sanap to defer the cross-examination because he wanted to meet his client in Arthur Road Jail to seek instructions for further cross-examination of Headley. The judge, however, refused to defer the matter and asked him to take instructions via video conferencing and also said that he would allow him to speak to Jundal via video conferencing and nobody, except a sheristadar (a court officer) would remain present in court when he would be speaking to Jundal and that the sheristadar would also not take note of their discussion.
However when Mr Wahab asked Jundal if he was ready to discuss via video conferencing, he refused and said that the mode was not reliable. The judge then rejected his application seeking to defer the matter for a day.
Headley denied the suggestion put up by the defence that he had suppressed the role of his wife Shazia Gilani, brother Danial and a friend Saulat Rana’s role in the 26/11 attacks in order to shield them.
He also denied that he had violated his plea agreement with the United States government by not revealing the complete truth of the Mumbai terror attacks and succeeded in saving huge amount because the FBI did not insist on a huge fine on him and also saved his property from being seized.
