Mumbai: Lt. Col. Prasad Shrikant Purohit has filed an application before the special NIA court seeking direction for the prosecution to supply him ‘untruncated’ copies of statements of all the witnesses and other documents that have already been provided to them in truncated form. He has claimed that by truncating names of witnesses and other details the prosecution has deprived him of his ‘statutory right’ to prepare for cross-examination of witnesses.
Special NIA judge Vinod Padalkar has posted this application for hearing on November 15, and prosecution is expected to file its reply on the same day.
“In all special enactments there is provision to keep the details of these particular witnesses in secrecy. This is in the interest of the witnesses that they should not be threatened or there should not be any interference from the accused persons,” said special public prosecutor Avinash Rasal.
The application filed by Col. Purohit stated that the extent of truncation is so wide that it is impossible to construe the true import of the contents of the statements. It is also said that by truncating the documents, the prosecution has deprived the accused in statutory right to prepare for cross-examination and his defence.
It is further mentioned that Purohit is entitled to know the names of witnesses as well as untruncated copies of statements and documents so as to enable him to prepare his defence and to instruct his advocate as to the truthfulness.
It is also contended that there are several witnesses who are also cited as witnesses in other trials and have deposed in the said trials and it is necessary to collect certified co-pies of their statem-ents/depositions in other cases for the purpose of contradicting them in the present trial. Therefore it is necessary to supply the names of those witnesses to the accused well before their examination.
