The trial in the Madan Tamang murder case is set to start soon in a Calcutta court, 15 years after the Gorkha politician was hacked to death in the heart of Darjeeling in broad daylight.
The city session court on Thursday framed charges against 47 people in the case. Framing of charges is a process where the court formally accuses a person of committing a specific offence based on evidence produced by the prosecution.
The main charges framed by the court were murder and criminal conspiracy with common intent.
“Trial will commence in the Calcutta court from the next date, which has been set for July 23,” said Amar Lama, who is a lawyer and Madan’s younger brother.
According to an earlier order, witnesses will have to be present in the Calcutta court when they are summoned. There are 80-odd witnesses in the case.
Madan Tamang, then president of the Akhil Bharatiya Gorkha League (ABGL), was hacked to death on May 21, 2010, just before he was to address a public meeting that many believed would have revealed "explosive details of hill politics". The venue of the meeting was Upper Clubside in Darjeeling, where Madan was killed.
The Bimal Gurung-led Gorkha Janmukti Morcha was in control of Darjeeling politics then. Madan had been alleging that Bimal and his party would accept an autonomous council with the name “Gorkhaland” and the Morcha was insincere about the demand for a Gorkhaland state.
The murder case had seen many twists and turns. The case was initially investigated by the CID. After Nicole Tamang, a central committee member of the Morcha and a prime accused, escaped from the CID custody, the case was handed over to the CBI.
The CBI named Gurung and his associates in a chargesheet submitted on May 29, 2015. Roshan Giri, Binay Tamang, Harka Bahadur Chhetri, Pradip Pradhan and Bimal’s wife Asha Gurung are among the accused persons.
Many leaders who are now with the Bharatiya Gorkha Prajatantrik Morcha (BGPM) are also accused in the case.
On August 17, 2017, the Calcutta city sessions court removed Gurung’s name from the chargesheet, stating that the CBI had failed to provide enough evidence.
Madan's wife, Bharati, then filed a revision application in Calcutta High Court against the lower court’s order. Last year, the high court set aside the lower court’s decision, and Gurung was again made an accused in the case.
A special leave application (SLP) was also filed in the Supreme Court by Bharati and the CBI with a plea to direct Bengal police to hand over an audio clip of the alleged conversation between Morcha leaders and cadres before and after Madan's murder.
“We have received a favourable order on the issue of handing over the audio clips,” said Amar.
