Salman Khan Car Hit Killing Case -Supreme Court sends Notice

Feb 20 2016 : The Times of India (Chennai)

Hit-and-run case: SC sends notice to Salman

New Delhi: TIMES NEWS NETWORK





The Supreme Court on Friday entertained Maharashtra government's appeal challenging actor Salman Khan's acquittal in a 2002 hit-and-run case despite stiff opposition from the film star, whose lawyers said the evidence was awefully inadequate as well as contradictory.

A bench of Justice J S Khehar and Justice C Nagappan issued notice to Salman while telling his counsel Kapil Sibal that the matter needed to be considered and the appeal could not be outrightly rejected. “If you were to be acquitted, it is better to get a well-considered acquittal from the Supreme Court,“ the bench said.
It indicated that outcome of the case would depend mainly on whether testimony of Salman's bodyguard and Mumbai police constable Ravinder Patil, who was accompanying the film star on the fateful night of September 28, 2002, could be relied upon.
Patil, who was the complainant in the case, had stated before magistrate that Salman was behind the wheels when his SUV ran over people sleeping on the pavement killing one and injured four people.
The bench said that it would decide whether the HC was right in discarding the testimony of Patil after Attorney General Mukul Rohatgi told the bench that HC committed a “legal error“ by not taking into account statements of the most crucial witness and terming his testimony as “not to be wholly reliable“.
The AG told the bench that Patil had very categorically stated that there were only three people -Salman, Kamal Khan and himself-in the SUV at the time of the accident and HC wrongly gave credence to the statement of Salman's family driver who surfaced 12 years after the incident and claimed to be driving the car on that day.
Referring to Patil's testimony before a Magisterial court, the AG said the bodyguard had said in his statements gave details of what had transpired on that night and he had also warned Salman not to drive the car at high speed. Patil died of tuberculosis in 2007 and defence could not cross examine him during trial in Sessions court.
Prima facie convinced with AG's submission, the bench said that it was inclined to consider the plea for quashing the acquittal order of the HC and sought response from the film star. Salman's counsel and senior advocate also did not object over notice being issued in the case but pleaded the court to allow him to argue the case for a minute to give his views on the incident. He then tried to demolish the arguments of Attorney General saying that Patil was not a reliable witness and he was not examin ed by Sessions court which heard the case after it was transferred for a Magisterial court.
Questioning the testimony of Patil, Sibal said the constable had not mentioned in FIR, lodged by him, that Salman was drunk on that day .He said that the Mumbai police had implicated the film star on the basis of forged bills and botched up chemical test of blood sample.
“There was no reference that he was drunk. He was a police personnel and the first that he should have said that Salman was drunk. After he died, Kamal Khan is only one crucial witness in the case but police did not examine him,“ Sibal said. Khan was charged with killing one person and injuring four by ramming his vehicle into a bakery shop in suburban Bandra in the wee hours of 28 September, 2002.