- By Abhishek Sheoran
- Wed, 17 Jul 2024 01:54 PM (IST)
- Source:JND
The Karnataka High Court on Tuesday granted bail to three accused linked with the murder of journalist-activist Gauri Lankesh, news agency PTI reported. Amit Digvekar, H L Suresh and K T Naveen Kumar were granted bail by Justice S Vishwajith Shetty after the trio sought relief citing delay in the trial.
Notably, another accused, N Mohan Nayak, was granted bail in the case in December 2023. “Though Section 22(4) of COCA provides for certain rigours for enlarging the accused on bail as against whom charges are made for the offences punishable under the COCA, the same cannot fetter the powers of this Court to enlarge the accused on bail when there is undue delay in trial and the material on record would go to show that the trial may not be completed any time soon,” the court had said.
Acclaimed Journalist Lankesh was on September 5, 2017, shot dead by two assailants outside her residence in Bengaluru. She was editor of the weekly Lankesh Patrike, which was known for its anti-establishment views. She had extensively written against the Sangh Parivar in Karnataka.
The chargesheet in Gauri Lankesh’s murder case stated that the assassination was an ‘organized crime’ executed by individuals linked to an extremist right-wing Hindutva organisation.
Between 2013 and 2018, as many as 17 persons, linked with the high-profile killing, were arrested by the SIT in Karnataka and Maharashtra.
Witness Turns Hostile:
A key witness in the Gauri Lankesh murder case, Madetira Thimmaiah, 46, from Kadagadalu village in Kodagu district, has turned hostile, claiming that the police forced him to make a confession statement, TOI reported. In 2018, Thimmaiah had made this confession before a court.
