A local court in Kolhapur on Wednesday extended the police custody of Sameer Gaikwad, an activist of the fringe right-wing outfit Sanatan Sanstha and prime suspect in the murder of veteran Communist leader Govind Pansare.
Mr.Gaikwad's custody has been extended till September 26. Despite the Kolhapur Bar Association's decision not to defend Mr. Gaikwad, a battery of nearly 30 Sanatan lawyers from different parts of Maharashtra descended upon the court where Sameer was produced amid robust security in the afternoon.
Mr. Pansare's kin were present in the court.
Mr. Gaikwad's 'defence' team has termed the investigation against him “ludicrous”, with one pro-Hindu outfit lawyer, Sanjeev Punalekar, observing that the probe was being directed by newspaper reports.
“The police will, in all probability, extract a false confession out of Mr. Gaikwad. Religious prejudice is strongly colouring the investigation,” said Mr. Punalekar.
Meanwhile, amid the growing clamour for a ban on the Sanatan Sanstha, Minister of State for Home, Ram Shinde said that the Maharashtra government would consider a decision to proscribe the Sanstha only after the investigation into Mr. Pansare's murder was thoroughly completed.
Speaking to reporters in Pune, Mr. Shinde asserted that the ruling BJP-Sena coalition was not being pressurized or influenced by any entity in the probe into Mr. Pansare's killing.
“The investigation is on the right track. There will not be any deviation or slackening of efforts to nab the culprits,” assured Mr. Shinde, urging opposition parties to “desist in playing politics” over the probe.
The Devendra Fadnavis government has been under pressure to ban the radical Hindu outfit ever since Mr.Gaikwad's arrest and the unravelling of the Sanstha's activities in Karnataka, Goa and Maharashtra in the wake of scholar-thinker M.M. Kalburgi's recent murder outside his home in Dharwad.
In Goa, BJP legislator Vishnu Wagh has called for a ban even as Goa Chief Minister Laxmikant Parsekar has demurred on grounds that the whole organisation [Sanatan Sanstha] could not be held responsible for the actions of one man [Gaikwad].
Meanwhile, a team of experts from the Gandhinagar-based Directorate of Forensic Science in Gujarat, at the behest of the Special Investigation Team (SIT) and the Kolhapur police, have been engaged in preparing a psychological profile of Mr.Gaikwad in a bid to aid the investigation.
