‘Fake’ encounter case: Former jail co-inmate denies knowing Tulsiram

The witness described the details of the two injuries on Tulsiram caused by firearms.

IN THE Tulsiram Prajapati alleged fake encounter case, a former co-inmate of Tulsiram at Udaipur central jail in 2005-06 Monday denied knowing him altogether. In a previous statement to the CBI in 2011, the inmate had told the court that he had written the complaint letters on behalf of Tulsiram in 2006, which were sent to various authorities including the district collectorate and National Human Rights Commission. Another inmate, who had deposed on June 8, had named this witness claiming that since his handwriting was better, he had written the letters on behalf of Tulsiram.

The witness had on June 8 dictated the letters, the inmate had claimed. Special Public Prosecutor BP Raju declared him hostile.

On Monday, however, the former co-inmate told the court that he could not write in English except signing his own name. He also told the court that he neither knew Tulsiram, nor had he ever helped in writing letters for him or any other inmates. Tulsiram in his applications to various authorities claimed that since he had witnessed the abduction of Sohrabuddin Shaikh and his wife Kausarbi by policemen from Gujarat and Rajasthan in November 2005, he was apprehensive about being killed in a staged encounter. Sohrabuddin was killed in an alleged fake encounter soon after his abduction and Kausarbi too was subsequently killed, the CBI claims. While returning from a court hearing in Ahmedabad to Udaipur jail, the accused policemen claimed that Tulsiram had tried escaping and was later killed.

Further, another witness who deposed was the medical officer who conducted the post-mortem of Tulsiram on December 28, 2006. The witness described the details of the two injuries on Tulsiram caused by firearms. The medical officer had also examined Ashish Pandya, a Gujarat policeman, who the CBI alleges had self-inflicted an injury upon himself, to prove that there was cross-firing between Tulsiram and the police team during the encounter.

While the witness had earlier told the CBI that another accused, Gujarat policeman RK Patel, had directed him to give a wrong opinion regarding how the injury could not have been self-inflicted, on Monday the witness told the court that he had given the report as part of his further opinion based on forensic report on presence of gunpowder.