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By:

Quaid Najmi

4 January 2025 at 3:26:24 pm

Bhujbal’s chopper lands in Pune parking lot

Mumbai : In what is suspected to be a breach of aviation protocols, a chartered helicopter ferrying Food & Civil Supplies Minister Chhagan Bhujbal from Mumbai to Pune skipped a designated helipad and landed in a vehicle parking lot almost a km away.   The shocker happened in Purandar taluka, where Bhujbal was slated to attend a function marking the 200 th  birth anniversary of the social reformer Mahatma Jyotirao Phule in his home village Khanwadi.   As crowds of bewildered people watched...

Bhujbal’s chopper lands in Pune parking lot

Mumbai : In what is suspected to be a breach of aviation protocols, a chartered helicopter ferrying Food & Civil Supplies Minister Chhagan Bhujbal from Mumbai to Pune skipped a designated helipad and landed in a vehicle parking lot almost a km away.   The shocker happened in Purandar taluka, where Bhujbal was slated to attend a function marking the 200 th  birth anniversary of the social reformer Mahatma Jyotirao Phule in his home village Khanwadi.   As crowds of bewildered people watched from around the sprawling parking lot, the helicopter appeared to drop speed in its flight, flew over some overhead high-tension electric cables, and descended gingerly into the parking lot - raising a thick dust-storm in which it disappeared for seconds - before touching the ground.   Moments later, the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) senior leader Bhujbal and others stepped out of the chopper, looked around in the unfamiliar territory before several vehicles and police teams rushed there. Minutes before there was chaos and confusion with some locals shouting warnings at the ‘wrong landing’.   Eyewitnesses said that the chopper’s powerful rotors created a thick dust storm and sparked alarm among the people in the vicinity, and many scrambled to the spot to check what exactly was going on in the parking lot.   Later, the Pune Police said that a designated helipad was available for the chopper landing but were at a loss to explain how the pilot missed it and veered off quite a distance away in the vehicle parking space. Subsequently, they asked the pilot to fly it to the correct landing spot.   Shaken and angry local NCP leaders questioned how a pilot flying a VIP on an official trip could mistake a parking lot for a helipad when the weather and visibility was clear. They demanded to know whether the helipad was improperly marked or it was a question of communication or sheer negligence.   The Pune Police indicated that they would report the matter to the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) which may take action against the errant pilot and the helicopter company.   “There was no accident. We all emerged safely. The helicopter pilot landed wrongly in a parking lot because the helipad was not visible. All of us are fine and there is nothing to worry,” said Bhujbal, before he was whisked off by his security team.   “There are many faults in numerous airplanes and helicopters, including maintenance issues and other problems. That's why I keep saying consistently that VIPs must exercise caution while flying. Fortunately, an accident was averted today, but that doesn't mean the authorities should be negligent. We expect the government to take urgent precautions.” Rohit R. Pawar, MLA, NCP (SP)

Messed up investigation puzzles ex top cops

Mumbai: A pall of gloom pervades the state’s police and security circles after yesterday’s Bombay High Court judgement that entirely overturned the trial court’s verdict by acquitting all the 12 convicts in the macabre 7/11, 2006 multiple bomb blasts in Mumbai suburban trains, killing 187 commuters.


Shaking their heads in disbelief, retired IPS officers and other senior police personnel termed the outcome as ‘shocking’, ‘unexpected’, ‘shameful’, etc., and they wonder who would be fall guys for the botched 7/11 probe that tumbled out in the piercing 667-page order delivered by Justice Anil S. Kilor and Justice Shyam C. Chandak. 


Ex-IPS and intelligence officers like Dr. P. S. Pasricha, S. M. Mushrif, Vikram Bokey, Shirish Inamdar and others who spoke with ‘The Perfect Voice’ without mincing words described how the verdict is a veritable slap on the investigation teams and the legal advisors involved in the probe. 


The judgement seemed to have inadvertently opened up the schisms within the state IPS lobbies as some made no bones of the discomfiture faced by their former colleagues, and the political establishment of the time. 


Simultaneously, the legal fraternity is abuzz with many lawyers and experts poring deeply into the verdict, the judicial nuances and its ramifications for the future, as many even grudgingly praised the judges for their ‘unorthodox findings’.


Experts speak exclusively with ‘The Perfect Voice’

Ex-DGP - Dr. P. S. Pasricha: Heading the Maharashtra Police at that time (2006), Dr. Pasricha gently said that he was not directly connected with the 7/11 probe which was handled by the then Mumbai Commissioner of Police A. N. Roy. Declining to comment on the verdict, Dr. Pasricha said that just as the (city) police team had grabbed all the credit for it then, now they should reply to the court outcome, too.

 

Ex-Additional Deputy Commissioner, State Intelligence Department Shirish Inamdar: This is unprecedented that an entire verdict of the Trial (lower) Court in a sensitive terror case has been quashed and set aside. 

“The questions that arise are the quality of evidence and the police’s skills to present it before the courts, the Trial Court’s ability in weighing that evidence. The HC ruling says that MCOCA was applied mechanically and not with an application of the mind. Why and how was it done as there are separate laws like POTA, TADA, UAPA, etc. for terrorism and such terror cases can’t be tried under MCOCA,” said Inamdar.


Ex-IGP Nagpur Range - S. M. Mushrif: All this cannot be erroneous. I feel that the arrests of those (accused) Muslim youths were intentionally done, the Trial Court verdict falls in the same category. 

“There was not an iota of evidence in the (7/11) case with the police, barring the confessions of the accused-convicts, who now stand cleared off all charges. Who was the legal advisor to the police who guided or helped in the 7/11 case investigations?” demanded Mushrif. 


Saying this is not the only case, but there are other cases in which the investigators deliberately or mistakenly botched, Mushrif asked how the government will deal with this to prevent recurrences.

 

Ex-DCP (IX) Vikram Bokey: He cautioned that the governments, at the Centre, Maharashtra and other states, ‘must not take the verdict lightly as it will have ramifications all over the country’, besides eroding public faith. 


“If this is the fate of the biggest railway terrorism in the world which claimed over 187 innocents, questions will be raised on the investigations, not only in this case, but in cases probed by other security/specialized agencies like the ATS, NIA, CBI, ED, NCB, or more,” warned Bokey, with a dozen encounters of notorious criminals to his credit.


Citing examples, Bokey added that doubts will naturally rise in public minds over the credibility of long-winded investigations into some high-profile cases in the recent past, which finally proved to be duds in the courts.


Inamdar urged that the government should appoint a commission of inquiry to probe the entire 7/11 case investigation team, affix the full responsibility and take action for the monumental lapses. 


Bokey and Mushrif aver that though the state has announced it will move the Supreme Court, “who knows how long it will take and what would be its outcome”. 


Hence, the government must initiate simultaneous efforts to find out the ‘real truth’ behind the 7/11 terror strikes without resorting to a witch-hunt targeting a particular group/community, and ensure justice is done to the victims.

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