• A High-Stakes Investigation and Weapon Recovery
• The Long Road to Justice and an Unfinished Story
Unmesh Gujarathi
Sprouts News Exclusive
The murder of Maharashtra’s Anti-Superstition Committee head, Dr. Narendra Dabholkar, remains unresolved even after 11 years. While two shooters received life imprisonment, the identity of the mastermind behind the assassination remains unknown. The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) spent Rs 7.5 crore in an attempt to recover the suspected murder weapon, generating intense controversy. Dr. Narendra Dabholkar was assassinated on August 20, 2013. Initially, Pune Police arrested arms dealer Manish Nagori and his associate Vikas Khandelwal. Still, the CBI discharged them, saying that they were innocent in the matter, but the CBI gave no evidence.
In May 2014, the Bombay High Court transferred the case to the CBI. The investigation led to the conviction of Sachin Andure and Sharad Kalaskar, while Virendra Singh Tawade, Sanjeev Punalekar, and Vikram Bhave were acquitted. CBI claimed that In 2018, Kalaskar confessed that, following Punalekar’s instructions, he had thrown parts of pistols into the Arabian Sea near Thane. To retrieve these, the CBI spent Rs 7.5 crore, hiring Dubai-based Envitac Marine Consultants, which deployed advanced Norwegian technology. Ukrainian divers were also part of the operation.
The expensive search successfully recovered one air pistol from the seabed, with costs reportedly shared by the CBI, Maharashtra Police, and Karnataka Police. However CBI claimed before the Court that no report was given by the said Envitac Company to the CBI and refused to give any details before the Court.
Investigators suspected that the same pistol was used in the murders of Dabholkar, journalist Gauri Lankesh, and scholar M. M. Kalburgi. The million-dollar question raised in the matter is: if the pistol used in the Dabholkar murder was later used in the Pansare murder, then on the very date of the Pansare murder, the pistol used in the Dabholkar murder case was in the custody of CBI; this means the pistol was taken from the custody of CBI, was taken to Kolhapur for murder, and was safely kept back in the custody of CBI.
Investigation agencies realized that while creating the picture of ‘all four murders by the same gang,’ they themselves had fallen into the trap and could not explain this. In order to buy time, the issue of sending the empty cartridges and bullets to Scotland Yard was circulated; something never happened; only some years passed by. But then CBI claimed to have taken a forensic report from a Gujarat lab that claimed that a pistol from Khandelwal and Nagori was not used in the Dabholkar murder; CBI refused to bring on record the said report despite filling out applications by the accused persons. This revelation only added to the mystery. Six years after recovering the pistol, the case finally reached a verdict.
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Forensic Reports are all equals – then it remains a mystery as to which forensic report was bogus- the one from Gujarat or Mumbai?
• The Long Road to Justice and an Unfinished Story Dr. Narendra Dabholkar was shot dead on August 20, 2013, at Maharshi Vitthal Shinde Bridge in Pune during his morning walk. Eyewitnesses claimed that two persons shot him and ran away on a bike.
In 2016, CBI claimed that Dr. Tawade was the mastermind and Sarang Akolkar and Vinay Pawar had shot Dr. Dabholkar; this was based on the similarity of a shooter with the photographs of Sarang Akolkar and Vinay Pawar’.
However, after Congress-led Karnataka government investigations in the Gauri Laneksh Case started arresting numerous people from Maharashtra, and High Court Bench consisting of Justice S.C. Dharmadhikar (whose father was a friend and co-worker of Dr. Dabholkar) started asking questions about the efficiency of CBI
CBI then in 2018 filed another chargesheet that virtually changed the shooters- not it said that Dr. Tawade continued to be the mastermind but Sachin Andure and Sharad Kalaskar had shot Dr. Dabholkar – basis? – again ‘the similarity of the assailants with the photographs of Sachin Andure and Sharad Kalaskar.
CBI always dodged to answer the question of how it can replace the shooters in this way. Later, the public prosecutor accused five individuals: Dr. Virendra Singh Tawade was labeled the mastermind, Sachin Andure and Sharad Kalaskar were charged as the shooters, and Vikram Bhave and Advocate Sanjeev Punalekar were accused of tampering with evidence. The suspects faced charges under IPC Sections 302 (murder), 120B (conspiracy), 34, sections of the Arms Act, and UAPA. The trial began on September 15, 2021, with 20 witnesses, including CBI’s investigating officer S. R. Singh and Dr. Dabholkar’s son, Hamid Dabholkar.
On May 10, 2024, Special Judge P. P. Jadhav delivered the much-anticipated verdict. The court acquitted Dr. Virendra Singh Tawade (linked to Hindu Janajagruti Samiti), Vikram Bhave (of Sanatan Sanstha), and Advocate Sanjeev Punalekar (of Hindu Vidhidnya Parishad) due to lack of evidence, despite the CBI previously identifying Dr. Tawade as the key suspect.
The Court convicted Sharad Kalaskar and Sachin Andure; the defense advocates, however, stated that they are going to challenge this order since the conviction was non-sustainable sustainable, to various factors, such as not conducting the Test Identification Parade and witness himself admitting in court that the that’resemblance’ was the only thing. The witnesses being in touch with office bearers of Andhashradhha Nirumlan Samiti were all pointing to only one thing- an acquittal. As of now, the challenge to convictions is pending before the High Court.
Sprouts News reveals that despite extensive investigations and technological efforts, critical questions remain. Who was the true mastermind? Was the actual murder weapon ever found? Could there be a larger conspiracy? Sprouts News reveals that these unanswered questions continue to shroud the case in mystery. Sprouts News reveals that while legal proceedings have concluded, the full truth behind Dr. Dabholkar’s murder remains elusive.
