MUMBAI, April 21: Mumbai police today opened its deposition in the Sada Pawle's killing with an attempt to discredit the key witness, Baldev Singh. Sub-inspector Avinash Sawant of the Nagpada police station, who was part of the team that killed Pawle and his close associate Vijay Tandel on September 26 last year, concentrated on disproving Baldev's claim that he was present at the spot when the two were shot dead ``in cold blood'' by the police.During his examination-in-chief Sawant dealt with the evidence given by Baldev earlier last week, without referring to it directly, almost point by point. While Baldev had said that Pawle and Tandel were unarmed when their car was intercepted by the police, Sawant maintained that Pawle was armed with an AK 56 and had in fact fired a few shots at the police before he was killed. Also, he made it a point to mention that the police had fired at the gangsters from a distance of 10 to 12 feet. Baldev in his deposition had said the shots that killed Pawle and Tandel wereshot shot from point-blank range.Recreating the events of September 26, 1997, Sawant said Assistant Police Inspector Vijay Salaskar that day had received information about Pawle and his associates' movements. He was told that the dreaded gangster would visit Rajawadi junction in Ghatkopar between 1.00 pm and 3.00 pm in a Fiat car. Accordingly, a 14-member team led by Salaskar set out in two Maruti 800s, one scooter and a motorcycle.He said around 2.10 pm he and Salaskar saw the feat car pass by and they could see that Sada Pawle was in the driving seat. He said there was another person in the car, whose identity they could not make out. Salaskar, he said, then waved his handkerchief to alert others of his team.He said Salaskar then drove the car and overtook the fiat car and intercepted it as it was approaching the Rajawadi junction. The two cars, he recalled, stopped at a distance of 10 feet from each other. ``Sada Pawle was the first one to get off.he was armed with an AK 56 rifle. I could seePawle standing 12 feet away from the spot where I stood,'' said Sawant. Sawant said Salaskar called out to Pawle and asked him to surrender, adding that at that point of time he saw Pawle raising his AK 56 rifle. ``Sensing danger to the lives of Salaskar and Desai, I fired at Pawle, who in retaliation fired shots from his AK 56 in the direction of Salaskar and Desai,'' he said. Sawant said that then both Salaskar and Desai fired at Pawle.``I saw Pawle falling down. When he fell down Desai was five to six feet away from him and on seeing Pawle fall we rushed towards him,'' claimed Sawant. Soon after a police wireless van arrived at the spot where by that time there was a traffic jam. ``We cleared the traffic and took the four injured - Pawle, Tandel, PSI Mayekar and constables Arun Jadhav to the hospital,'' he said.Sawant's description of the encounter is completely at variance with what Baldev had earlier told the enquiry commission. Baldev had claimed that he was driving the fiat car and that apart fromPawle and Tandel there were three others in the car - Pawle's brother Anand, his sister Hausabai and Anand's wife Anita. He had also said that the car in which Salaskar had intercepted them was a Maruti 1000.
