UK citizen moves 26/11 court for Pak passport seized from Taj

An HUL employee,Uttam Patel,had come to the court with an authority letter to claim Malik’s passport,laptop bag,pen drive,charger and two mobile phones. Special Public Prosecutor Ujjwal Nikam gave no objection to the plea and the court ordered its staff to hand over the documents and other things to Patel.

Meanwhile,the prosecution,while making its final arguments,stated that the claims by lone arrested gunman Ajmal Kasab about police torturing him and making him confess under duress are false and part of his strategy to escape from the clutches of law. Kasab had retracted his confessional statement claiming that it was recorded under duress and not voluntary. The prosecution said the retraction was an after thought and after consultation with his lawyer.

Nikam also clarified that the guilt plea by David Headley in a Chicago court for charges of being involved in the Mumbai terror attacks won’t have any bearing on the case going on in Mumbai. “I am very curious to know to what charges will Headley plead guilty to and it will only establish our claim that all the attackers were from Pakistan. However,the bearing on the present case would be negligible,” Nikam said. “Lashkar-e-Toiba has different modules for carrying out different activities,the present accused in the case Fahim Ansari and Sabahuddin Ahmed were entrusted with making hand-made maps of the targets while Headley as per his confessions was told to make video shooting of the possible targets,” he said.

Nikam will argue his case against Ansari and Ahmed on Friday putting forth that concrete evidence was before the court to prove their role in the case.