Sohrabuddin case: Witness turns hostile, fails to recognise cop

Sohrabuddin Shaikh and his wife.

IN THE Sohrabuddin Shaikh alleged fake encounter case, another witness against an accused Rajasthan policeman turned hostile on Wednesday. The witness, an Udaipur resident, who had deposed in 2011 against accused Abdul Rehman, a police inspector with Udaipur police, told the court he did not know who Rehman was. This takes the prosecution count of witnesses turning hostile in the case to 48 of the 66 examined so far.

The CBI claimed that in July 2011, a statement of the witness, a hotel owner, was taken, where he had said Rehman was investigating the murder of his brother in 2004. He had said in his statement that Rehman had told him that Sohrabuddin was involved in his brother’s murder and that he had brought a sharp shooter named Tulsiram from Madhya Pradesh for the crime in 2004. He had also told the CBI that Rehman regularly visited his hotel and during one such visit “2-3 days prior to the news of the encounter of Sohrabuddin appeared in newspapers”, Rehman had told him that Sohrabuddin had been nabbed by Gujarat Police and that he, along with the superintendent were going to Ahmedabad. As the accused policemen facing trial claim that Sohrabuddin, a wanted criminal, was killed in an encounter when he was trying to escape, the CBI, through the prosecution witness on Wednesday, attempted to prove that he was in the custody of the Gujarat Police prior to the encounter, as told allegedly by Rehman to the witness in 2011. The witness, however, denied being told anything by Rehman.

On Wednesday, the witness told the court that his brother was murdered in 2004 due to the support he had extended to the owners of Mariam Marbles in a dispute with some men. The men had allegedly murdered his brother. He told the court he did not know who Sohrabuddin was. “A CBI officer had come and inquired about Sohrabuddin at my hotel. I had told him that I did not know anything. It is not true to say that Abdul Rehman was investigating the murder case of my brother or that he was coming to my hotel and had informed me that Sohrabuddin was arrested. Main Abdul Rehman ko janta hi nahi hun (I do not know Abdul Rehman),” the witness said.

When the witness was asked by special public prosecutor BP Raju who visited his hotel, he said “customers”. When probed further, the witness denied it, even as the defence objected. Raju asked the witness to look around the courtroom to see if he can identify anyone who visited his hotel. The witness denied knowing anyone. “It is not true that I am deliberately avoiding to identify Abdul Rehman despite knowing him to save him,” he said. The deposition of witnesses will continue on Thursday.