Mumbai: Bombay HC reserves order in BJP MLA Nitesh Rane’s pre-arrest bail plea – Times of India

MUMBAI: The Bombay high court on Thursday reserved for order a plea for pre-arrest bail filed by BJP MLA Nitesh Rane. An interim oral assurance given by the public prosecutor not to take any coercive steps against him would continue till Monday when the order is to be pronounced.
Rane, a member of legislative assembly (MLA) belonging to Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is seeking protection against arrest in connection with an attempt to murder case registered last month in Sindhudurg. His senior counsel Niteen Pradhan had argued before Justice C V Bhadang said the invoking of an offence of attempt to murder was “preposterous” and filed only as an “outcome of the lampooning” that Aaditya Thackeray had faced outside Vidhan Bhavan last month when BJP leaders were protesting, he said.
In his submissions the special public prosecutor Sudeep Pasbola argued that a co-accused Sachin Satpute was arrested and he was a close associate of Rane. He said Satpute’s statement was recorded and it was found that all co-accused except Rane were in telephonic contact with each other and the police have the call data record.
Pradhan said merely having call data records without having the contents of the call is prosecution on the basis of surmises and conjecture. He said nothing was recovered from any of the accused, thought the police are trying to claim that it was a case of contract killing.
The investigating officer in his affidavit before the HC had said that Rane had contacted Satpute, who is a close confidante to whom he had entrusted this work of assaulting the complainant, through the mobile phone of his personal assistant Rakesh Parab.” He had added that Rane “deftly covered his tracks in order to distance himself from… Satpute.”
Co-accused Manish Dalvi who also sought pre-arrest bail argued through his senior Ashok Mundargi that he was earlier named a witness and it is not explained why or how he was made an accused.
In a rejoinder that Rane had filed, he said that there is “malice in fact” in the investigation “for ulterior political motives and the outcome of some lampooning outside Vidhan Bhavan on December 23, 2021,” adding, “There is also no explanation in the reply (of the police) either admitting or denying the conduct of the material witness.”