SMITA PANSARE Vs. STATE OF MAHARASHTRA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) By this interim application, the applicants (appli-cants Nos. 1 and 2 are the daughter and daughter-in-law of deceased Govind Pansare) seek the following reliefs :

(2.) Learned Counsel for the applicants submits that this Court has been monitor-ing the investigation of the murder of Com-rade Pansare in the aforesaid petition, be-ing Writ Petition No. 3512/2015, and, that the police have been filing reports with respect to the investigation carried out by them, from time to time. He submits that several orders have been passed by this Court since 2015 till date. He submits that as far as Comrade Pansare-s case is con-cerned, till date, the shooters in the said case have not been arrested, much less the masterminds.

(3.) The principal ground for seeking transfer of the case, from Special Investigat-ing Team (-SIT-) which is presently conduct-ing the investigation, to Anti-Terrorist Squad (-ATS-), Maharashtra, is, that the real break-through in all the four murder cases i.e. in the murder cases of Dr. Dabholkar, Comrade Govind Pansare, Dr. M.M. Kalburgi and Gauri Lankesh, came when ATS, Maharashtra investigated the Nallasopara Bomb Blast case in 2019. He submits that although, the Central Bureau of Investigation (-CBI-) had named Sarang Akolkar and Vinay Pawar (also alleged shooters in the present case) as accused in Dr. Dabholkar case, however, had subse-quently dropped their names, at the time of filing of the supplementary charge-sheet on 13/2/2019, as it had transpired that two of the accused arrested in the Nallasopara case i.e. Sharad Kalaskar and Sachin Andhure, were infact the alleged shooters in Dr. Dabholkar case. He further submits that the ATS charge-sheet filed in the Nallasopara-s case on 18/2/2019 reveals the gravity of all the four cases i.e. Comrade Pansare, Dr. Dabholkar, Prof. Kalburgi and Gauri Lankesh and that the accused arrested in all the four cases as well as in the Nallasopara Bomb Blast case are front-line accused. He further submits that there exists a common sophisticated net-work of criminals and organization behind the four murders. In order to place on record, the gravity of the situation in all the four cases, learned Counsel relied on an extract from the charge-sheet titled as