'Salman Khan accident files burnt in Mantralaya blaze'

Mumbai, May 27
The Maharashtra government's home and law & judiciary departments do not have any records pertaining to the Salman Khan accident case of September 28, 2002, an activist said here on Wednesday.

A Right To Information query by Mansoor Darvesh has revealed that the files were burnt in the June 21, 2012 devastating fire that engulfed Mantralaya, the state government headquarters in south Mumbai.

"I had filed the RTI query to the two departments seeking information on the total number of counsels, lawyers, solicitors, legal advisors, public prosecutors, etc. engaged and appointed by the state government to fight the case," Darvesh said here.

He even asked for the total expenses incurred by the state on the case, from the start in 2002 till the judgement by the Mumbai sessions court on May 6 this year.

However, the government responded with partial information stating that the documents related to the case was lost in the 2012 fire and "therefore, it cannot be made available".

All that the state government has knowledge about is the appointment of the last (current) Special Public Prosecutor Pradeep Gharat since September 2014 by paying a fee of Rs.6,000 per hearing, he said.

"Interestingly, the state officials had promised to reconstruct all the destroyed files, but till date it has not managed to do so. Salman Khan's accident case is one such example. The government is unaware how much expenditure it has incurred during the course of the case," Darvesh said.

On the early morning of September 28, 2002, Salman had rammed his Toyota Land Cruiser onto a footpath in Bandra where people were sleeping, killing one and injuring four others.

On May 6 this year, he was convicted for 'culpable homicide not amounting to murder' and other charges and sentenced to five years imprisonment.

The actor appealed against the sessions court ruling in the Bombay High Court which suspended the sentence and enlarged him on bail.