RJD leader Mohammad Shahabuddin was acquitted on Monday by a Jharkhand court in a triple murder case, involving a railway contractor and a Youth Congress leader 28 years ago, due to lack of evidence.
Shahabuddin, now in Tihar Jail in Delhi in connection with a double murder in Siwan, was produced before the court of Additional Sessions Judge Ajit Kumar Singh here through video conferencing.
The triple murder had taken place at Jugsalai here in 1989. An FIR had been lodged against unidentified persons based on the statement of Brahmeswar Pathak, bodyguard of murdered Pradip Mishra, the then East Singhbhum district Youth Congress president.
But Shahabuddin, a member of the national executive of the RJD and a four-time MP of the party from Siwan in Biahr, was later made the accused in the case along with eight others in the killing of Mishra, railway contractor Anand Rao and his associate Janardhan Choubey. Pathak and K.T. Rao, an aide of the railway contractor, had been injured in the incident.
While four of the accused were killed in police encounter and gang rivalry, the other four were acquitted by the court for lack of evidence in 2006 barring Shahabuddin, who did not appear before the court.
Altogether nine eye-witnesses, including two doctors and an investigating officer were examined in the course of the trial, no evidence could be established against Shahabuddin and he was acquitted.
