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Journalism of Courage
Senior Congress leader Ahmed Patel on Tuesday submitted a list of 42 witnesses, including aide-de-camp (ADC) to Karnataka Governor Vajubhai Vala, in his defence before the Gujarat High Court, which started a trial in the election petition challenging his win in the 2017 Rajya Sabha elections from the state.
The petition has been moved by BJP nominee Balwantsinh Rajput who had lost to Ahmed Patel. Rajput had quit the Congress in the run-up to the polls to join the BJP.
Patel has also listed conversant officer of telecom company Vodafone among the witnesses and has sought mobile phone records of nine numbers between July 10, 2017 and August 10, 2017.
Some of these numbers belong to former Congress leader Shankarsinh Vaghela, his son Mahendra, petitioner Rajput, state Education Minister Bhupendrasinh Chudasama among others. There are two other numbers that are uploaded on a website in the name of “Gokul Infracon Pvt Ltd”. Rajput is said to be one of the directors of the firm.
The list of witnesses also include Chief Electoral Officer of Gujarat, Chief Secretary J N Singh, Director General of Police Shivanand Jha, Ahmedabad Police Commissioner A K Singh, the then Anand District Superintendent of Police Saurabh Singh, the then Inspector of Anand police station and several Congress MLAs, including Shaktisinh Gohil and Arjun Modhwadia among others.
Following the submission, Justice Bela Trivedi asked the petitioner’s lawyer to file an affidavit by January 28.
He is likely to be cross-examined by Patel’s lawyers on February 1.
Justice Trivedi refused to entertain request of Patel’s lawyers for adjournment on the ground that a petition has been moved in Supreme Court in this case.
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