The special MCOCA court charged Chhota Rajan under various sections of the IPC and MCOCA and set September 7 for recording of statements
Gangster Chhota Rajan pleaded not guilty, even as a special MCOCA court framed charges against him yesterday in connection with the 2011 murder of journalist J Dey paving the way for trial.
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After framing the charges under various sections of IPC (for conspiracy, murder and abetment) and Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act (MCOCA), the judge S S Adkar via video conferencing asked Rajan, “Tumhala manya aahe ka (do you plead guilty)”, to which he replied, “Mala manya nahi (not guilty).”
Gangster Chhota Rajan
Cross examination
The judge then set September 7 as the date for recording the statements of the witnesses and allowed the gangster to cross-examine them if required. Before Rajan was arrested in 2015 in Bali, the court examined four witnesses, which included the police officers involved in the preliminary investigation in the case.
A supplementary chargesheet was filed on August 5 by the central probe agency, where it claimed that mid-day’s editor (investigations) was murdered at the behest of the don since his articles and a planned book portrayed Rajan as ‘chindi’, against his staunch rival Dawood Ibrahim.
Rags to riches
The chargesheet that also named 41 witnesses against Rajan cited the book that Dey planned to write titled ‘Chindi- Rags to Riches’, wherein he was going to script down stories of 20 gangsters starting from humble background.
“Dey was going to expose the fake patriotic mask used by him (Rajan) to secure himself and to accumulate wealth for his family. The book was to have that Rajan had no concern for those who made him big,” the charge sheet had said.
After Rajan was deported to India, the Maharashtra government declared that CBI would handle the case. In February this year, a sample of a conversation between Rajan, now lodged in a high-security cell in Tihar jail and another man wherein they discuss the plan to kill Dey was submitted in the court. The 2012 police chargesheet of 3,055 pages names Jigna Vora, now on bail for allegedly instigating Rajan to execute Dey owing to professional rivalry.
The accused
In 2011, the first chargesheet named 10 accused including Rohee Thangappan Joseph alias Satish Kalya, Abhijeet Shinde, Arun Dake, Sachin Gaikwad and Rajan’s aide Nayan Singh Bisht (absconding) among others, against whom charges got framed last year.
In June 2011, Dey, who was riding a bike, was shot dead when four bike-borne men fired four to five rounds at him.
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