A city court on Monday granted the special investigation team, probing the murder of CPI leader Govind Pansare, to take the custody of Viredra Tawde, arrested in the Narendra Dabholkar murder case by the CBI.
As Tawde’s CBI custody expired, judicial magistrate VB Gulve Patil sent him to 14 days’ judicial remand, and also permitted the state-appointed SIT to take his custody. “We have got the permission to take custody. We will decide when to take his custody now,” said Harshad Nimbalkar, the special prosecutor in Pansare case.
Tawde, an ENT doctor and a member of the conservative Hindu group Sanatan Sanstha, was likely to be arrested in the Pansare case, he said. “After taking his custody, the SIT will first interrogate him and then decision will be taken on his arrest (in that case),” said advocate Nimbalkar.
The CBI produced Tawde in the court as his five-day custody got over. It sought another four days’ custody, saying he was not cooperating and was trying to be “deceptive”. As Tawde’s wife was returning from London on Monday, the CBI wanted to confront Tawde with her, its lawyer BP Raju said.
Raju also informed that the CBI had found out 119 bank accounts of the Sanatan Sanstha. Rudra Patil and Vinay Pawar, two of its members who are absconding, were signatory of some of these accounts, it said. While Dabholkar, an anti-superstition crusader, was shot dead in Pune in August 2013, Pansare, known for his rationalist views, was murdered in Kolhapur in February 2015.
A book on spirituality written by Sanatan’s founder Jayant Athavale criticises Dabholkar, advocate Raju said, citing some passages. He also cited a passage from ‘Kshatra Dharma Sadhana’, another of Athavale’s book, which says a ‘sadhak’ (Sanatan’s disciple) can eliminate an enemy by only chanting a few lines from the book.