Two get life imprisonment for Narendra Dabholkar's murder; three acquitted
New Delhi, May 10: A pune court on Friday awarded life imprisonment to two persons for the killing of activist Narendra Dabholkar in 2013. However, three other accused were acquitted by the court.
Head of the Maharashtra Andhashraddha Nirmoolan Samiti, Narendra Dabholkar was killed in Pune on August 20, 2013, allegedly by members of a fringe group.
Following the murder of Dabholkar in Pune, Govind Pansare was shot dead in February 2015 and MM Kalburgi in Kolhapur in August the same year. Gauri Lankesh was killed outside her residence in Bengaluru in September 2017.
Initially, the case was investigated by the Pune police. However, it was later taken over by the he Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) in 2014 after the order of a Bombay High Court. Dr Virendrasinh Tawade, an ENT surgeon linked to the Hindu right-wing organisation Sanatan Sanstha, was arrested in June 2016. Tawade was one of the masterminds of the murder.
Sanatan Sanstha, with which Tawade and other accused were associated, purportedly opposed the activities conducted by Dabholkar's organisation, the Maharashtra Andhashraddha Nirmoolan Samiti (Committee for the Eradication of Superstition in Maharashtra).
- With inputs from agencies
