Mumbai, Oct 23: On the occasion of Diwali festival, a special court has allowed 86 accused on bail in the 1993 bomb blast case, including actor Sanjay Dutt, to move around in Maharashtra to meet their relatives and friends. On a plea made by defence lawyer Farhana Shah, designated judge P D Kode allowed the accused to visit any place in Maharashtra till October 28.
The accused have also been allowed to leave Maharashtra limits with prior permission of the court. However, the court directed the accused to file a written programme of their visit in advance to the registrar and warned them against maintaining contact with absconding accused.
Accused Sayed Abdul Rehman, Karji Adijania, Russi Mulla and Anant Bhoir were permitted to visit Gujarat while Samir Hingora, Asafur Rehman, Mohammed Sultan Sayed and Mohammed Ahmed Mansoor Ahmed were allowed to go to Delhi during Diwali.
Mulchand Shah was permitted to visit Rajasthan to meet his relatives while Sanjay Dutt has been allowed to go to Ooty for film shooting. All the accused have been exempted till November 2 and asked to appear before the court on November 3.
Sanjay is facing the charge of possessing an AK-56 rifle and destroying the weapon. He has already denied the charges.
CBI examined 686 witnesses and the evidence has crossed 13,000 pages. The accused are charged with carrying out serial blasts on March 12, 1993 which killed 257 people and injured 713 besides damaging property worth Rs 27 crore. Bureau Report