Fake arms case: No bail for Lt Col Purohit

Pune district sessions court on Tuesday rejected the bail application of Malegaon blast accused Lt Col Prasad Purohit in the fake arms licence case.

Pune district sessions court on Tuesday rejected the bail application of Malegaon blast accused Lt Col Prasad Purohit in the fake arms licence case. The case was heard by sessions court judge Shalini Phansalkar-Joshi.

Purohits advocate Shrikant Shivade argued that Purohit was falsely implicated in the case,to invoke MCOCA,and that his client was not connected with Hindu organisation Abhinav Bharat. Additional public prosecutor Shashikant Jagtap said that Purohit had paid and procured the gun licence from an arms dealer. The hearing was earlier deferred after Jagtap sought time from the court in order to produce certain documents from Jammu and Kashmir,pertaining to the firearms licence.

The state anti-terrorism squad was given two weeks time to investigate the details. Pune ATS team under Inspector Peter Lobo conducted the investigations. The fake arms licence case was registered against Purohit following a complaint registered by his family friend Date. The complaint stated that Purohit had prepared fake documents to provide Date with the arms licence. The prosecution found clues of Lt Col Purohits links with Hindu outfits. The prosecutions case is that Purohit had helped Date obtain the firearms licence from Anantnag district in Jammu and Kashmir in 2005.

Date had returned the licence to Purohit in 2006 because he was erroneously identified as a major in the Indian Army,and secondly,the competent authority had issued the licence for a rifle and not a revolver.

After Purohit was arrested in the Malegaon bomb blast case,Date had registered a case against him with the ATS,Pune,for allegedly issuing him a fake firearms licence. Purohit is the prime accused in the Malegaon blast case.

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