Salman Khan hit-and-run case: Matter adjourned till 25 July

The hearing in Salman Khan's hit-and-run case was adjourned today as witnesses Kalpesh Verma and Amin Sheikh's statements were missing from the police file. The court directed the police to search for their statements. Meanwhile, high drama ensued in court yesterday, when a prosecution witness turned hostile and went back on his earlier statement. Sachin Kadam who was then a security guard at the now defunct Neel Sagar hotel became the first witness in the case to have been declared hostile. In his earlier statement given to the police in 2002, Sachin had stated that he saw Salman getting out of the right side of his car and that he had committed the accident and was running away from the people who were following him. Yesterday though, Sachin chose to deny his earlier statement. "My statement recorded by police that I had seen Salman exiting from the driver's seat and running away from the people is incorrect," Sachin reportedly said and added that he had only told the police about a big car ramming into the shutter of the shop. The public prosecutor, on hearing this, asked the court to declare Sachin hostile. With the case now standing adjourned to 25 July, Salman can breathe easy for a few days.