Mumbai: In a major relief to Hindu Rashtra Sena (HRS) chief Dhananjay Desai, the prime accused in the murder case of a Muslim youth in Pune, the Bombay High Court granted him a bail on Thursday. It was for the second time that Desai has knocked at the High Court’s doors. Earlier, the court had rejected his application seeking bail, as the prosecution had not filed its charge sheet. Even the Pune sessions court had twice denied him bail.
Desai is accused of distributing pamphlets and giving an inflammatory public speech on January 19, 2014, which instigated Hindu youngsters to commit violence in Pune district as a result of which Mohsin Shaikh, an IT worker was attacked. He died on the spot.
A single-judge bench of Justice Sadhana Jadhav granted him conditional bail, after hearing the both sides. In his application filed through advocate Sanjiv Punalekar, Desai had sought bail contending that he was ‘innocent’ and was falsely implicated in the case. Desai argued that the prosecution did not produce any evidence against him which can show the alleged murder of Sheikh has anything to do with his speech.
