A Delhi court has asked the SSP of Ghaziabad to file a report on the plea of Ajay Katara, a key witness in Nitish Katara murder case, that he was being threatened and harassed at the behest of powerful Uttar Pradesh politician D. P. Yadav for testifying in the case.
Additional Sessions Judge J. R. Aryan, who had earlier also sought a report from the Senior Superintendent of Police on the issue, fixed the matter on March 9 for further hearing.
“Let SSP take notice of this application and provide personal security to the applicant (Katara),” the court said.
Katara, who testified that he had last seen victim Nitish alive in the company of accused Vikas Yadav, Vishal and Sukhdev Pehalwan, filed a fresh plea alleging he was being threatened at the behest of Yadav.
“Yadav is an MLA of the ruling party. He is using his influence on SP of Badayun and others to arrest Katara so that he may come under pressure to file an affidavit or change his stand,” the application said.
The witness claimed 10 fake cases were being lodged against him at various police stations in Ghaziabad at the instance of Yadav, father of Vikas who has been sentenced to life term in the case, and that he could be killed.
The plea was filed in the case against Pehalwan, a co-accused who is standing a trial separate from convicts Vikas and Vishal as he had absconded after the offence. It began in 2005 when he surrendered before the police.
Vikas and his cousin Vishal were sentenced to life imprisonment by a Delhi court for killing Nitish, a business executive and son of an IAS officer, as they did not approve his intimate relations with their sister Bharti Yadav.
The Yadavs have challenged their conviction in the Delhi High Court.
The court is presently hearing final arguments in the case as the prosecution had wrapped up recording of statements of its witnesses with the testimony of Inspector Anil Somania, who had probed the sensational murder case.
According to the prosecution, Pehalwan was present with the accused in their Tata Safari car after they had abducted Nitish from a marriage function at Ghaziabad on the intervening night of February 16-17, 2002.
They had allegedly killed Nitish on that fateful night.
