Three injured eye-witnesses appear in court in Salman Khan's hit-and-run case

The infamous hit-and-run case featuring Salman Khan took a new turn yesterday when police produced three eye-witnesses namely Muslim Shaikh, Kaleem Shaikh and Manu Khan who were injured that fateful night when Salman allegedly drove his Land Cruiser over people sleeping on the pavement before ramming into a bakery thereby killing one person and injuring four. The re-trial commenced with deposition of panch witness Samba Gowda, who had drawn the panchnama of the articles seized by the police on 28 September, 2002. In his statement, Gowda, who hails from Karnataka, said that he had seen a big car involved in the accident and that the car rammed into a laundry and its bumper collided with the shutter of the shop. Gowda further stated that he saw glass pieces; number plate of the car and bumper parts lying on the spot which were seized by police and a panchnama was drawn by him. “I can identify the articles collected by police from the place of accident,” said Gowda. After his deposition, the court asked the police to present the articles as the three witness had to identify them. The prosecution then informed the court that the case-related articles had not yet been handed over to the sessions court after the matter was transferred from the Bandra magistrate court in January last year. This prompted the court adjourned the proceedings to 2 May. It was in December, last year that the court ordered a fresh trial on the ground that the witnesses had not been examined in the context of aggravated charge of culpable homicide, which was invoked against the actor midway through the case. Salman will now have to be present in the court on 2 May failing which an arrest warrant would be issued against him.