Malegaon blast case: RDX not planted at home of accused: Former ATS officer

His deposition began in March and went on till April 13. The witness ex-officer also denied the “signatures of independent witnesses, claimed to have been present during the search of Chaturvedi’s home, were taken on blank pages”, and that “nothing was seized from the house”.

The defence lawyers for the accused claimed Chaturvedi, a source of the military intelligence wing, was booked in another case in Matunga, where keys to his house were seized and later used for planting evidence.

Rebuffing the claim, the ex-officer also denied the ATS had deliberately not informed any army officials about the search. He also rejected the allegation that the then ATS chief – Hemant Karkare, who died during the 2008 Mumbai terror attacks – had given instructions to him to prepare false documents to implicate the accused.

The former officer had also questioned Dilip Patidar, a resident of Indore, who went missing in 2008 after he was summoned by the ATS. He denied that Patidar was called a suspect and that he was “physically and mentally tortured in the custody of ATS”. “It is not correct to say that Dilip Patidar was forced to narrate the facts as per the say of the ATS team. It is not correct to say that as he was not giving the statement as per our say and hence, we assaulted him and he succumbed to injuries and passed away,” the witness said.

In 2018, the Madhya Pradesh High Court set aside the trial against the ATS officer and another official for the alleged role in Patidar’s disappearance, as there was no sanction by the state government to prosecute them.