TEAM HERALD
PANJIM: Principal District and Sessions Court Judge B P Deshpande will conduct hearings into the alleged rape charge against Tehelka founder editor Tarun Tejpal after additional sessions Judge-I Pramod Kamat recused himself from hearing the case last week.
Kamat had offered to recuse himself from the case and had asked Tejpal to file objection if any, since he as law secretary – had participated in the decision-making process of appointing senior counsels for the prosecution in the case. Tejpal, in his reply last week had stated he did not have any objection to Kamat hearing the case.
The judge, however decided not to proceed with the case to avoid possible controversy in future,
The Sessions Court will meanwhile hear the non-compliance petition against Crime Branch on October 13. Tejpal had charged the Crime Branch with furnishing him illegible DVDs of the alleged rape incident and purposely submitted irrelevant video footage of national news channels to the Central Forensic Science laboratory at Hyderabad for cloning. He pointed out that by not complying with the Fast Track Court order, he is forced to suspect that the Crime Branch is not discharging its duty.
The matter to be heard pertains to an order passed by the FTC, in May asking the State to hand over the unedited portion of CCTV footage of the area near the lift of a Bambolim starred hotel to the rape accused within 20 days.
