MUMBAI/BANGALORE:
A special court on Friday remanded Malegaon blast accused Sudhakar Chaturvedi to
the custody of Mumbai ATS till December 3, a day after the tough Maharashtra
Control of Organised Crime Act (MCOCA) law was invoked against him and nine
others arrested in the case.
In a related development,
Dayanand Pandey, one of the accused in the case, was subjected to narco analysis
test at the Forensic Science Laboratory in Bangalore.
Seeking the custody of
Chaturvedi, national coordinator of Hindu right wing group Abhinav Bharat,
Special Public Prosecutor Rohini Salian told the court that Lt Col Srikant
Prasad Purohit, another accused in the case, revealed during his narco test that
Chaturvedi was in constant touch with the army officer in arranging meetings
among the arrested persons in Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra.
Therefore, Chaturvedi's
interrogation was necessary, she said.
Opposing his custody, defence
lawyer Naveen Chomal said Chaturvedi has been "falsely implicated" in the case
and there is no evidence against him.
He said Chaturvedi is going to
be tortured for extracting a confessional statement.
Earlier in the day, Chaturvedi
was produced in a Nashik court which the ATS to take him to the MCOCA court in
Mumbai.
Nine other accused in
Malegaon blast case, including Purohhit and sadhvi Pragya Singh Thakur, will be
produced before the MCOCA court on November 24.
In Bangalore, Dayanand Pandey
underwent a narco analysis test, becoming the fourth accused to be sujected to
the scientific test. Purohit and Ramesh Upadhayay were subjected to narco here
on November 10 while Chaturvedi on November 18.