Malegaon blasts: NIA punches holes in ATS reasons for applying MCOCA

NEW DELHI: While dropping charges under MCOCA against the accused in the 2008 Malegaon blasts, the National Investigation Agency pointed to two other blast cases reported before the formation of Abhinav Bharat in which right-wing extremists were named as accused.

According to the NIA’s chargesheet accessed by ET, the first blast was reported in 2003 at a mosque in Parbani, where 31 persons were injured while the second blast was triggered in 2004, again at another mosque in Jalna. Both cases were investigated by the Maharashtra ATS. After the trial, all the accused — Sanjay Chaudhary, Maruti Keshav Wagah and Yogesh Despande — were acquitted in the Jalna blast case, while they were discharged in the Parbani case. NIA while punching holes into ATS probe implied in its chargesheet that Malegaon blast accused Rakesh Dhawde was wrongly implicated in Jalna and Parbani blast so that MCOCA could be applied against him.

“ The first chargesheet in 2004 Jalna blast was filed by ATS on January 7, 2008, and the second supplementary chargseheet, only naming Dhawde, was filed on November 15, 2008, on the day of his arrest for the Malegaon blasts.

It may be mentioned that in this case (Jalna), no accused was shown as wanted in the earlier chargseheets,” the NIA said. “Sukhwinder Singh, additional CP at ATS sent a letter to police inspector Aurangabad of ATS and instructed him that Dhawde disclosed that he had organised a training camp in July/ August 2003 at Singhgad near Pune in which the arrested accused in Parbani blast case had participated,” NIA said.

Similarly, another letter sent “on November 7, 2008, by Mohan Kulkarni, ACP ATS to police inspector at Jalna informs that Dhawde provided logistical support and imparted training to accused in Jalna blast.” Dhawde was named as an accused in both Jalna and Parbani blasts.