The Central Bureau of Investigation which is prosecuting the Panjim police station attack case, in which Panjim MLA Atanasio Monserrate his wife and Taleigao MLA Jennifer Monserrate and several others including former mayors Uday Madkaikar, Tony Rodrigues and others are accused, produced a copy of the original complaint on Friday allowing the trial to continue.
Adv Bupesh Prabhudesai who is representing some of the accused said that the examination in chief of the complainant continued on Friday after a copy of the complaint was produced before the court.
“Today they have produced the original copy of the complaint. On the last occasion they had said that they would produce secondary evidence but suddenly they produced the original complaints so that’s why the chief (examination) continued,” Prabhudesai said.
“On 6th (of December) the cross (examination) will start,” he added.
“Another issue is that accused No. 3 was not yet identified, he and one other accused is yet to be identified, so that’s why it is adjourned today,” he added.
Babush Monserrate and his wife Jennifer and others stand chargesheeted by the CBI for having on 19th February 2008 attacked and damaged the Panaji Police Station.
On the day of the incident Atanasio “Babush” Monserrate, his wife Jennifer (who wasn’t a legislator then), the then Mayor of the Corporation City of Panaji, Tony Rodrigues and several others gathered near Babush’s house at Taleigao (on the outskirts of the capital city) at around 7:30 pm and thereafter proceeded with a morcha to reach the Police Station at Panaji, where they sat on a dharna.
They shouted slogans against the Police and demanded the suspension of one Police Inspector Sudesh Naik, alleging that the police had failed to take any action on a complaint filed by one Ryan Godinho against certain persons for having violently attacked and wrongly confined him.
At around 9pm Monserrate addressed the morcha and issued an ultimatum that if Naik is not suspended within half an hour they would “enter the police station and teach a lesson to the police.”
After several attempts from the district administration to pacify the crowd failed, at around 9:30 pm the crowd pushed the police personnel who had cordoned the Police Station and attacked them with stones, broken bottles, and other such materials. They also attacked the public property of the Panaji Police Station, including doors and glass windows by pelting stones. A motorcycle was set on fire and other vehicles were also damaged.
When the mayhem ended 41 police personnel were injured out of whom 25 had to be hospitalised.
