Gauri trial: Prosecutor files list of witnesses

NT Correspondent
Bengaluru

During the second day of the trial in the Gauri Lankesh murder case, the Special Public Prosecutor filed a list of witnesses before a Bengaluru City Civil and Sessions Court on Tuesday. The defendant’s attorney, in response, appealed for a list of electronic evidence that is part of the investigation.

On the first day of the trial on Monday, the defence lawyers asked Gauri’s sister, Kavita Lankesh, also the complainant in the case, if Gauri had angered the Naxalites by facilitating the surrender of some of the ultras. The lawyers also asked Kavitha to explain the nature of the relationship Gauri had shared with Jignesh Mewani and former JNU student leader Kanhaiya Kumar who the slain journalist often described as her ‘ideological sons’.

Invoking a Hindutva metaphor, the lawyer asked Kavitha if these were the same people who belonged to the “tukdetukde gang”. The judge overruled this line of questioning, saying it is irrelevant to the case.

According t o a chargesheet which was filed over three years ago by a Special Investigation Team (SIT) department of Karnataka police, Lankesh’s murder case involved 18 men from fringe groups that targeted people they considered to be anti-hindu. Seventeen of the accused have been arrested. Of them, Vikas Patil alias Dada alias Nihal, is still at large.

On Monday, Kavita had told the court that suspicious people were moving around the house (before the murder), but they had not taken it seriously as they were unaware of the gravity of the situation. Defence counsel Adv P Krishnamurthy listed out some of the most prominent intellectuals who were Gauri’s friends and alleged that they were Naxal sympathisers.

This included the late freedom fighter HS Doreswamy, the late playwright and Jnanpith awardee Girish Karnad, social commentator Chandan Gowda and Gujarat MLA Jignesh Mewani. Gauri, 55, was shot dead at her residence in west Bengaluru on September 5, 2017. The SIT investigation found that the accused number 1 Amol Kale had planned the murder and hired the assassins. Kale is associated with Hindu Janajagruti Samiti, which is affiliated to Sanathan Sanstha.