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Dayanand Pandey (Source: Express Photo by Prashant Nadkar/File)
A SPECIAL court has rejected an application filed by a Malegaon 2008 blast accused, claiming his name was not Dayanand Pandey. The accused, Swamy Amrutanand, had told the court that his was a case of mistaken identity. He said that before renouncing the world he was known by the name Sudhakar Dhar Dwivedi. He submitted before the court that he had no idea who Pandey was. The Maharashtra Anti-Terrorist Squad, which had arrested him in 2008, had alleged that Pandey was his alias.
He told the court that there was no material to show that he was Pandey and the prosecution had relied on the name only to falsely implicate him. He further said that two documents prepared by the ATS showed that two different persons were arrested in 2008.
The National Investigation Agency, which took over the probe from the ATS and continued to call the accused Pandey, objected to the application. Special public prosecutor Avinash Rasal submitted before the court that the accused had filed similar applications in the past and that his identity could be decided upon at the time of trial.
He said the 2008 remand report showed that there was no substance in the argument that two different persons were arrested.
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Special Judge S D Tekale in his order said a similar contention was raised by the accused in 2011 and 2013 where the court had ruled that it should be decided at the time of the trial.
“The remand report dated 14/11/2008 shows that the person arrested under the document of ‘Fard Giraftari’ on 12/11/2008 & then on 14/11/2008 as shown in the remand report is the same i.e. accused No.10. Mere on the ground that investigating officer has shown arrest of accused No.10 again on 14/11/2008, it cannot be said that two different persons were arrested. In view of all these reasons, I find substance in the submission of learned SPP that as this application is premature and as already previous similar applications are decided, this application is not tenable,” the court ruled.
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