Coimbatore: "Nearly 1,000 kg of gelatine was procured from a private explosive dealer in Mysore in Karnataka for the Coimbatore serial blasts in February 14, 1998," the prosecution counsel told the Judge of the Special Court for Bomb Blast Cases, K. Uthirpathy, here on Tuesday.

The Defence Counsels, P. Thirumalairajan and M.H. Abdur Rahmaan, said that the prosecution counsel T. Balasundaram and T.A. Selvaraj continued with their arguments relating to conspiracy by the banned outfit Al-Umma.

The prosecution arguments were in respect of procurement of gelatines from a dealer in Mysore. Its arguments were based on the evidence deposed by a number of witnesses from Mysore including explosive dealers, engineers in charge of irrigation projects and explosive agents besides that of an approver in the case.

Prosecution argued that extremists sourced the gelatine from a private explosive dealer firm run by Riaz-ur-Rehman, who had subsequently turned an approver in the case.

The dealer was licensed to provide explosive materials for irrigation projects and the employees had diverted the explosives to extremists for their subversive activities, the prosecution argued. Mohammed Dasthagir, an employee of Riaz-ur-Rehman was arrested in connection with the same and was lodged at the Coimbatore Central Prison, where he died in 2002. Prosecution based its arguments also on the evidence given by officials from three agencies involved in irrigation projects in Karnataka. They pointed out that the purchase invoices with the agencies in charge of irrigation projects never tallied with the records relating to purchase/sale and stock maintained by the explosive dealer in dispute. In addition to the particular explosive dealer, staff from two others explosive dealers from Mysore had also been examined earlier as witnesses.

Riaz-ur-Rehman had earlier given evidence before the Judicial Magistrate Court (prior to the committal proceedings for transferring the case to the court of appropriate jurisdiction). But before the trial court, he had given evidence totally contradicting his earlier deposition. With Riaz-ur-Rehman having been given pardon as an approver under sec 307 Criminal Procedure Code (CrPC) and the prosecution not treating him as a hostile witness, the defence counsel had pleaded that the depositions made by the approver before this court should be taken on record as it was.

His deposition before the trial court should supersede the one given by him before the Magistrate before the committal proceedings, Mr. Thirumalairajan said. Arguments relating to transportation of these explosives to Coimbatore and procurement from Kerala are likely to be taken up by the prosecution on Wednesday and Thursday respectively.

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