Sohrabuddin...

The last accused was the owner of the farm house in Gujarat where Sheikh and Kausar Bi were, according to CBI, illegally detained before they were killed.

The 13-year-old case saw several twists and turns, including 92 prosecution witnesses turning hostile, and 16 accused getting discharged during the course of the hearing since 2014. “Key witnesses of the prosecution turned hostile, due to which the abduction of Sohrabuddin and further sequence of events has not been proven,” the court said. “Two main prosecution witnesses turned hostile. What could the prosecution have done? It couldn’t have forced them not to turn hostile,” the judge said.

This year saw a more curious twist to the case with the emergence of the theory that Judge BH Loya, presiding over the CBI court at the time, died in peculiar circumstances on November 30, 2014. The Supreme Court in April dismissed multiple petitions demanding an inquiry into Loya’s death.

The CBI said the three victims who were returning to Sangli in Maharashtra from Hyderabad in a bus were taken into custody by a police team on the intervening night of November 22-23, 2005. The couple was taken in one vehicle and Prajapati in another. CBI alleged that Sheikh was killed on November 26, 2005, by a joint team comprising Gujarat and Rajasthan police, and Kausar Bi three days later. Prajapati, who was lodged in Udaipur central jail, was killed in an encounter on the Gujarat-rajasthan border on December 27, 2006, the CBI said in the charge sheet.

The CBI took over investiga- tion from the Gujarat’s crime investigation division on orders of the Supreme Court in 2010 and claimed that Prajapati was a key witness to the abduction, as he was travelling with the slain couple, and a joint police team of Gujarat and Rajasthan police killed him in a fake encounter apprehending that he could spill the beans.

On Prajapati’s alleged encounter killing, the special court said, the prosecution failed to prove that the third person with the couple was Prajapati. “Till 2011, nowhere it came on record that Prajapati was the eye witness to abduction of Sheikh and his wife,” the court said, adding that it was only in the fourth supplementary charge sheet that CBI revealed the identity of the third person accompanying the couple as Prajapati.

The court said that the prosecution failed to prove that Prajapati had been abducted from Ahmedabad and was taken secretly by two people. The court observed that, “In fact the prosecution witnesses have testified that he was seen in train with guards with his hands tied. The prosecution failed to prove involvement of the then Gujarat top cop DG Vanzara in the conspiracy,” the court said.

Sharma said that the court cannot rely solely on “circumstantial and hearsay evidence” while acquitting the remaining accused in the one of the most high profile encounter cases in India in this century. against the ruling dispensation. It has not been shown as to how the impugned order is vitiated by mala fide or what is the bias. It is not spelt out as to what is the oblique motive in passing of the impugned order. One fails to understand as to how the ruling dispensation has in any way erased, effaced or defamed Pt Nehru,” the court said. It added that YI had “hijacked” AJL.

“The ‘subject premises’ was leased out to legendary AJL for its publication, but the dominant purpose is now practically lost. This Court is constrained to observe that major portion of the ‘subject premises’ has been rented out and petitioners’ newspaper, which was to be housed originally in the basement and ground floor, has now been shifted on the top floor with hardly any ‘press activity’,” the court said.

The Congress said AJL will challenge the high court’s order. “The AJL is going to appeal against the order. It has a strong case and there is no illegality. We are confident that we will get justice based on strong facts and evidence in our favour,” said Congress spokesperson Jaiveer Shergill.

Attacking the Congress over the issue, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) said the matter was a “text book case” of corruption. In the Narendra Modi government, the Congress will not be allowed to “loot” the country, Union minister and BJP spokesperson Ravi Shankar Prasad said. Industries, the world’s fourthlargest generic drugmaker, whose wealth declined $4.6 billion.

South Korea’s tycoons didn’t escape the carnage either. The market rout lopped $17.2 billion from the fortunes of the country’s seven richest people. The father and son who control Samsung Electronics, Lee Kun-hee and son Jay Y Lee, account for more than a third of that decline.

In Hong Kong, titans of real estate took a big hit. Li Ka-shing, who retired as chairman of CK Hutchison and CK Asset in March, lost $6 billion in 2018, while Lee Shau Kee, the city’s second-richest person, ends the year about $3.3 billion poorer.

There were still plenty of winners to emerge from the wreckage of 2018.

Lei Jun, the chairman of Chinese smartphone maker Xiaomi Corp, added $8.7 billion, with a July initial public offering catapulting him into the Top 100 of the Bloomberg index after he started the year outside the ranking. The IPO also turned three of his co-founders into billionaires.

Japan’s richest person, Tadashi Yanai, added $6.3 billion to his fortune as shares of Fast Retailing Co, the world’s largest apparel retailer, surged 30%. India’s Mukesh Ambani added $4 billion to his fortune and eclipsed Alibaba Group Holding Ltd’s Jack Ma as Asia’s richest person, thanks in part to the performance of Reliance Industries Ltd.

Among the winners, the Bloomberg Billionaires Index added new members in technology, consumer, biotech and pharmaceuticals.

At least six Asian billionaires died, leaving behind a total of $29 billion.

The RLSP has since joined the Mahagatbandhan, or grand alliance, of the Congress and the Rashtriya Janata Dal in Bihar.

A BJP leader, who did not wish to be identified, said the deal has been finalised in a “cordial” manner and expressed hope that the Janata Dal (United) of Nitish Kumar – the third partner of the NDA in Bihar – will remain on board.

In November, Shah announced in the presence of Kumar that the two parties will contest an equal number of seats in Bihar.

But, five seats for Paswan leaves the BJP and the JD(U) to share 35 seats between them.

Leaders in the BJP and the JD(U) remained tightlipped on how they will share these 35 seats between them. “We would like to contest 18 of these 35 seats, leaving rest 17 for the JD(U),” a BJP office bearer said on condition of anonymity.

Another leader familiar with the discussion and who asked not to be identified said the JD(U) and the BJP may get 17 seats each, with the remaining seat going to 35-year-old Mukesh Sahni, an aspiring politician who is widely known as “son of mallah” in Bihar.

Mallah (boatman) is an Other Backward Classes caste in Bihar, and accounts for around 14% of the state’s population.

A Bollywood set designer, Sahni has launched the Vikasheel Insaan Party and aims to contest the forthcoming parliamentary election from Muzaffarpur seat, currently held by the BJP.

Two senior JD(U) leaders did not respond to queries on seat sharing.

Kumar also reached the national capital later in the evening on Friday and is expected to sign off on the seat-sharing deal.