Mumbai: The Bombay High Court on Wednesday allowed extradited gangster Abu Salem to withdraw his petition challenging separation of his trial from the other accused in the 1993 Mumbai bomb blasts case.
The court held that "it would be appropriate for the petitioner to approach the Supreme Court", as he has raised some important issues, and High Court cannot hear his case.
A Division bench of Justice J N Patel and Justice Roshan Dalvi also refused Salem's lawyer's plea to stay framing of charges in other cases against him, saying that he was free to apply to respective courts trying those cases for this purpose.
While passing this order, the Judges also remarked that "it is high time the TADA judge had pronounced the judgement in 1993 bomb blast case."
Salem's lawyer Nitin Pradhan had challenged separation of Salem's trial in 1993 blast case, saying that according to the extradition treaty between Portugal and India, Salem was to be tried only for certain specified cases, and separating his case from rest of 1993 case amounted to starting a new case against him, which violated the treaty.
Similarly Pradhan challenged framing of charges against Salem in 1993 blasts case on the ground that charges were framed after interrogating him, while extradition treaty contemplated only trial and not fresh interrogation.
But CBI objected to Salem's coming to High Court, stating that as per TADA act, all appeals would lie directly in the Supreme Court.
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