Mumbai: A week after the wife of Azam Khan (co-accused in the Hamid Lala murder case with Sohrabbudin and Tulsiram Prajapati) requested security for her husband so that he could appear in court as an eyewitness in the Sohrabuddin case, the special court witnessed a return to the hostile witness saga on Monday.
Nasir Hussain, who was lodged in the same jail as Prajapati, retracted his earlier statements and was declared hostile on Monday. So far, 122 witness have been examined in the case, of which 74 have turned hostile. The three witnesses who deposed on Monday were Dr Rakesh Patel, Inspector Trilok Singh and Nasir Hussain.
Nasir Hussain, an undertrial who was charged with rape in 2004, had mentioned in his earlier statements to the Central Bureau of Investigation(CBI) that in December 2005 or 2006, Tulsiram Prajapati was arrested for Hamid Lala’s murder. He further described an incident that took place two-three months after Prajapati was jailed, saying, “One day jail superintendent Niyaz, Tulsiram and Azam were standing near the gate of the jail and talking, Suddenly, Tulsiram began speaking loudly and superintendent Niyaz signalled to the jail staff, who then brutally assaulted Tulsiram and Azam; when inmates Ali and Rafiq went to save them, they too were beaten.”
When Public Prosecutor Raju Moray questioned him on his earlier statement, Nasir denied in court that he knew Prajapati, saying, “I do not know any person by the name Tulsiram Prajapati. I do not know he was beaten in jail.” He also denied writing a letter dictated to him by Prajapati which said the latter’s life was in danger and police wanted to kill him in a fake encounter.
Meanwhile, the other two witnesses, Dr Rakesh Patel, who had conducted the post mortem of Prajapati and had provided medical treatment to police officer Ashish Pandya, who was injured by a bullet and Inspector Trilok Singh from Pratap Nagar, stood by their earlier statements.