MUMBAI: Another witness in the 2008 Malegaon blast case told the trial court here on Thursday that the Maharashtra Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS) tortured and forced him to name RSS leaders during the probe.
As the witness denied having given a voluntary statement to the ATS, Judge P R Sitre of the special court for National Investigation Agency (NIA) cases declared him hostile.
Of 222 prosecution witnesses examined in the case so far, 17 have turned hostile (refused to support the prosecution case).
The witness told the court on Thursday that the ATS, which had probed the case initially, took him in custody multiple times and he was tortured.
ATS officials forced him to name the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) and its leaders, he alleged.
He was not an RSS member, nor did he know the name of any RSS functionary, the witness said.
Earlier, another prosecution witness had told the court that the ATS forced him to name Yogi Adityanath (now Uttar Pradesh chief minister) and four RSS leaders.
On September 29, 2008, six people were killed and over 100 injured when an explosive device strapped to a motorcycle went off near a mosque in Malegaon, a communally sensitive town in north Maharashtra's Nashik district.
The accused in the case include BJP MP from Bhopal Pragya Singh Thakur, Lieutenant Colonel Prasad Purohit, Sudhakar Diwedi, Major Ramesh Upadhyay (retired), Ajay Rahirkar, Sudhakar Dwivedi, Sudhakar Chaturvedi and Sameer Kulkarni.
All of them are out on bail.