Kalburgi case: Two accused produced in Dharwad court

Dharwad: Two persons arrested in connection with the murder of scholar MM Kalburgi were produced in the court of the fourth additional judge in Dharwad on Tuesday.
The two accused are Amol Kale and Praveen Prakash Chatur alias Krishnamurthy, who were brought from Parappana Agrahar Jail in Bengaluru and Dharwad Central Prison, respectively.
Amit Baddi, Ganesh Miskin of Hubballi and Vasudev Suryavanshi of Maharastra, lodged in Arthur Road Jail in Mumbai, and Sharat Kalaskar, in Yerawada Jail in Pune, could not be produced on Tuesday because of technical issues.
They are being brought to Dharwad.
Gourishankar, the counsel for the accused, was supposed to cross-examine the main witnesses Roopadarshi, the daughter of Professor Kalburgi, Umadevi, the slain scholar’s wife, and another person.
However, he sought permission to defer the cross-examination, saying he would prefer to cross-examine other witnesses first.
The public prosecutor objected to this plea.
Judge Panchakshari Maheshwari, after hearing both sides, reserved her order on the application for Wednesday.
Section 231 of the Criminal Procedure Code says that on the date fixed, the judge shall proceed to take all such evidence as may be produced in support of the prosecution.
The judge may, at his/her discretion, permit the cross-examination of any witness to be deferred until any other witness or witnesses have been examined or recall any witness for further cross-examination.
The case will come up for hearing again on April 8 and the other accused — Amit Baddi, Ganesh Miskin, Vasudev Suryavanshi and Sharat Kalaskar alias Patil — will be produced in court on that day. Kalburgi was shot dead at his residence in Kalyan Nagar, Dharwad, on August 30, 2015.
The case was initially given to the CID.
After the murder of journalist Gauri Lankesh, a special investigation team (SIT) was formed and Kalburgi’s murder case was also handed over to the SIT.
The murder of Gauri Lankesh and the subsequent investigation and arrests gave out the clues that some persons involved in Lankesh’s murder were connected to the Kalburgi murder case.
Meanwhile, fed up with the delay in taking the investigation to its logical end, the slain scholar’s wife, Umadevi Kalburgi, approached the Supreme Court for justice.
The apex court then directed the CID to form the SIT and intensify the investigation.