The fate of 19 accused in the Gulshan Kumar murder case would be decided tomorrow as the sessions court delivers its judgement nearly five years after the audio king was shot dead in suburban Juhu, Mumbai.
Additional sessions Judge M L Tahilyani would start delivering the judgement in the open court on Monday but legal circles say that the verdict may spill over two days and the operative part is expected to be available on April 24.

In all probability, 15 accused may be acquitted as the prosecution conceded last week that there was no evidence against them and urged for their discharge. These accused had been implicated by the accused-turned-approver Mohammed Ali Shaikh, who later turned hostile.
Since the approver had not supported the prosecution's case of the alleged conspiracy hatched to kill Gulshan Kumar, evidence against these 15 accused had whittled down, public prosecutor Ujjwal Nikam had submitted in arguments on April 16.

The 15 accused are Javed Kalia, Rafiq Ansari, Rafiq Falke, Imtiaz Merchant, Adil Khan, Aftab Alam Ershad Khan, Jaffer Sharif, Faiyaz Ahmed Chougale, Feroz Khan, Wasim Alias Babuji, Abdul Mohammed Khan, Fatima Daud Merchant, Sabir Ali Mazhar Hussain, Abdul Kavi Mohammed Idris Shaikh and Mohammed Azam Abdul Kavi Shaikh.
The prosecutor, however, argued that there was strong evidence against Rauf Raja, Abdul Rashid Daud merchant and Ramesh Taurani, director of TIPS cassettes. Taurani had given Rs 25 lakhs contract money to the prime conspirator Abu Salem through music composer Nadeem Akhtar Saifee, while the other two had killed the victim, he alleged.

Bureau Report