Udaipur:
The Udaipur police now claim that Azam Khan, a key witness in the Sohrabuddin Sheikh fake encounter case, actually staged the murderous attack on himself.
(Read: Who was Sohrabuddin Sheikh?)Azam Khan is one of the Central Bureau of Investigation's (CBI's) key witnesses, who claimed that Sohrabuddin was eliminated after a deal was struck between former Rajasthan Home Minister Gulabchand Kataria and the state's marble lobby.
The police now claim Azam Khan used a friend's help to stage his shooting.
"Azam Khan's friend Iqbal has confessed to the police that the entire shooting was stage-managed," said Sanjiv Narjari, the SP of Udaipur.
Iqbal has reportedly said that Azam Khan put him up to it - to shoot him and claim that they were attacked.
Reports on Wednesday said that Azam Khan was admitted to a government hospital after he was shot at in Udaipur. He was said to have received bullet injuries in his left arm. His condition was, however, stated to be out of danger.
(Sohrabuddin case: Witness Azam Khan shot at)In November 2005, Sohrabuddin was shot dead on the outskirts of Ahmedabad. His wife, Kauser Bi, was also killed. At the time, Gujarat's Anti-Terror Squad (ATS) said that Sohrabuddin was a terrorist who planned to assassinate Narendra Modi. In 2007, the Gujarat state government admitted in court that Sohrabuddin and Kauser Bi had been wrongly killed. Some of the state's senior-most policemen are in jail, charged with murder, criminal conspiracy, and kidnapping.
(With PTI inputs)