Another night in jail for Salman
JODHPUR: A local court in Rajasthan’s Jodhpur on Friday adjourned Bollywood star Salman Khan’s bail hearing in the 1998 blackbuck poaching case to Saturday and summoned the record of the trial from the lower court, his lawyers said.
Khan, lodged in Jodhpur Central Jail after being handed a fiveyear imprisonment for poaching the two blackbucks at Kankani village, has also challenged the chief judicial magistrate court’s verdict and sought suspension of the sentence.
District and sessions court judge Ravindra Joshi listed his bail plea for hearing on Saturday after the 52-year-old’s counsel moved an application that included 54 grounds challenging the lower court’s verdict. “We told the court that the trial court has ignored many facts in its decision,” Khan’s counsel Mahesh Bora said. Bora said Khan has fulfilled all the orders of the court, so his sentence should be suspended and he should be granted bail.
A copy of Khan’s application under section 389 of the CRPC was handed over to public prosecutor Pokarram Bishnoi on the court’s direction. Bishnoi told the court the trial court’s records should be summoned before deciding on the suspension of the sentence.
Meanwhile, the actor had an eventful day behind bars as actor Preity Zinta, who has been his co-star in seven films between 2000 and 2013, came to visit him for about 20 minutes. Khan’s sisters Alvira and Arpita also met him.
Superintendent of Jodhpur Central Jail Vikram Singh said Khan was in his own clothes on Friday as well because the jail uniform for him was being stitched. The actor, who is prisoner No. 106, had a siesta of three hours on Friday, the superintendent said, adding that he was served dal, mix vegetable and chapatti for lunch. Earlier, the actor got up around 8.15am on Friday and didn’t take the morning tea and breakfast.
Though sources claimed Khan got non-vegetarian food from a hotel, jail authorities denied this.
On Thursday evening, Singh told reporters that the actor was given four blankets to sleep on the floor and there were two ceiling fans in his barrack.