KOCHI: Hearing the petition to cancel the bail granted to actor Dileep in the 2017 actor assault case, the Additional Special Sessions Court on Thursday asked the prosecution to check the file creation dates of the audio recordings in the pen drive that director P Balachandrakumar had handed over to the police. The court said so when Dileep’s counsel B Raman Pillai demanded the authenticity of the pen drive be checked after the prosecution played one of the audio clips before the court. Balachandrakumar had handed over the device claiming Dileep attempted to influence witnesses.
Pillai pointed out that the audio, according to Balachandrakumar’s statement, was recorded on a Samsung tablet but as the device was damaged, the clips were transferred to a laptop and later to the pen drive. Pillai submitted that the statement contradicts the prosecution’s claims that the audio clips were transferred from a mobile phone to the pen drive.
After the court enquired whether the pen drive was sent for analysis at the Forensic Science Laboratory (FSL), the prosecution said it was sent to FSL in February, with the report still awaited. Dileep’s lawyer claimed that a copy of the clips from the pen drive given to them reveals that the files were created on various days in November 2021. In response, Public Prosecutor K B Sunil Kumar said the dates are of files transferred to the pen drive and not the dates when the files were created. The court then observed that the prosecution should ascertain when the files were created and on which device the audio was recorded.