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The CBI has said it has recovered a pistol from a creek of the Arabian Sea near Thane following a search for weapons reportedly dismantled and dumped by one of the accused in the Narendra Dabholkar murder case in July 2018. The weapon will be examined by forensic and ballistics experts to ascertain whether it was linked to the murder, officials said.
The CBI had made the first arrest in the case in 2016 by apprehending Sanatan Santha member Dr Virendra Tawade, an ENT surgeon and alleged mastermind of the conspiracy. In 2018, the agency named Sachin Andure and Sharad Kalaskar as the two shooters, who allegedly opened fire at Dabholkar on the morning of August 20 in 2013, and arrested them. In May last year, Mumbai-based Sanatan Sanstha lawyer Sanjeev Punalekar and his aide Vikram Bhave were arrested.
The rusted body of a country-made pistol has been recovered from the creek with help of expert divers and special equipment, and it will be examined before a conclusion is drawn, said CBI sources. It is likely that it is one of the four firearms allegedly dismantled and disposed of by Kalaskar, an official said on the condition of anonymity.
CBI officials refused to comment on the exact location, time and date of the recovery. “It has been recovered recently,” said an agency official.
A Special Investigation Team of the Maharashtra Criminal Investigation Department (CID) is currently probing the February 2015 murder of veteran communist leader Govind Pansare. Karnataka Police, on the other hand, is probing the August 2015 murder of Kannada scholar MM Kalburgi and the September 2017 murder of Gauri Lankesh. All these investigation agencies have said in the past that these murders are closely linked with each other and have many common suspects. Investigators have not ruled out the use of same firearms in more than one of these cases.
Advocate Virendra Ichalkaranjikar, defence counsel for some of the accused in the case, said, “We have not come to know about any such recovery… That is why I will not be able to comment… But if what is being reported in media is true, we earnestly feel that the trial in the case should begin as soon as possible. The accused in the case have been in prison without any trial and have been denied their fundamental rights.”
In earlier court hearings, CBI officials said that it was Kalaskar who first opened fire and shot at Dabholkar twice. Andure pulled the trigger twice but one bullet misfired while the other hit Dabholkar.
CBI has also arrested three others — Amol Kale, Amit Digwekar and Rajesh Bangera — who are also accused in the 2017 murder of Gauri Lankesh. Kale, Digwekar and Bangera have not been chargesheeted yet.
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