Prosecution Failed to Prove Criminal Conspiracy

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: One of the major setbacks for the prosecution was its failure to prove the criminal conspiracy part in the palm chopping case, which resulted in the acquittal of 18 persons.

Similarly, some of the independent witnesses turned hostile, dealing another setback to the prosecution.

One of the major turnaround was that the investigation agencies, including the NIA and the Kerala Police, could not prove their claim that a conspiracy was hatched at Seemas Auditorium and the KWA Inspection Bungalow to attack Prof T J Joseph.

The court in its judgement ruled out the claim that the accused had took Seemas Auditorium and the KWA Inspection Bungalow on rent for hatching the conspiracy.

However, the accused had booked Seemas Auditorium for a convention of the SDPI a few weeks before the controversial question paper incident. The Inspection Bungalow was also booked before the incident.

The Kerala Police and the NIA had used details of the telephone/mobile conversations of the accused as evidence to prove their involvement in the criminal conspiracy.

However, the court observed that the accused were members of the Popular Front of India, and that it was natural for them to communicate with each other. “It does not mean that all of them were part of the ‘criminal conspiracy’ to attack T J Joseph,” the court stated.

From the pamphlets seized from the residences of the accused persons, it was clear that the PFI had taken the question paper incident as an insult against the Muslim community. 

Several independent witnesses in the case turned hostile, but the court did not consider that.