MUMBAI: The Thane special court on Saturday granted bail to 89 accused in the April 2020 Palghar lynching case in which two seers and their driver were killed by a mob in a village in Kasa.
The arguments on their bail applications were heard by district Judge S B Bahalkar on January 6. Special public prosecutor Satish Maneshinde had then told the court that the accused men seeking bail were present at the crime scene on April 16, 2020, but they had no active role to play in the crime.
The Kasa police had filed a case of murder and other sections against a mob of over 500 unknown persons from the tribals villages in Kasa. Most of those arrested were from the Gadchinchale village in Kasa where the lynching took place.
Of the 246 accused, 115 are already out on bail. There are 16 minors arrested in the case, of which nine are on bail.
Advocate for the accused Amrut Adhikari had maintained that those seeking bail were arrested based on their cellphone locations at the time of the crime.
The case is being handled by the state Crime Investigation Department (CID). Three FIRs have been registered with the Kasa police station in this case. The seers Chikne Maharaj Kalpavrukshagiri (70), Sushilgiri Maharaj (35) and their driver Nilesh Telgade (30) were lynching while on their way to Surat in Gujarat to attend a funeral during the lockdown. Police concluded that the attack was a fallout of rumours of child-lifters.