India: Journalist Gauri Lankesh’s Murder Case Begins After Five Years
Location: India, Bangalore Date: July 6, 2022
***Updated on July 14, 2022
The hearing of the Gauri Lankesh murder case began on Monday, July 4 after almost five years in a Bangalore court. The 18 accused of killing the journalist appear in a sessions court. The Coalition For Women In Journalism (CFWIJ) demands justice for Gauri and calls for due process to be done for the court process.
Veteran journalist Gauri Lankesh was shot dead outside her home by two assassins on a motorcycle on September 5, 2017. She was the editor of Lankesh Patrike, a Kannada-language weekly tabloid known for its criticism of right-wing extremism and the establishment. The newspaper covered issues about communal violence and the caste system.
Since Gauri’s murder, the special investigation team from the Karnataka police has been investigating the killing of the journalist. The 21-member special investigation team filed its initial charge sheet in May 2018 and filed an additional 9,325-page sheet in November 2018. 18 people were accused in connection with the killing, according to the news sources. On January 10, 2020, 17 suspects of the killing were arrested. One suspect remained in hiding as of January 11, 2020, the news outlet NDTV reported.
The hearing of the case was planned to begin with the recording of the statements of the first court witness, Kavitha Lankesh, the younger sister of the murdered journalist, who lodged a complaint right after her sister’s killing. However, the prosecution began the trial with the recording of the evidence of court witness number four, who was supposedly a close associate of accused K T Naveen Kumar, according to the Indian Express.
The court summoned the first court witness to begin the trial on May 27, however, did not record Kavitha’s statement as some suspects placed in Maharashtra prison were not presented in court. "Prison officials at Bangalore and Mumbai's Arthur Road Prison were directed to ensure the virtual presence of the defendants during the trial," the court said in a May 27 order.
The principal presiding court has set up a schedule for the conduct of proceedings regularly, with hearings being held for five days each second week of the month. The hearing began on July 4 this month and ends on July 8.
The judge of the court has also set ground rules for the trial. According to the rules, the witnesses will be cross-examined frequently and if particular witnesses need to cross-examine depending on the defense request, an application has to be filed in advance. The judge also underlined that such an action would create heavy costs in case of the lack of any application for the recall of witnesses.
During the trial, nine witnesses of the case were examined with the defense counsel. On day 2, the defense counsel focused on Syed Shabbir, a gun shop owner from Mysore. His statement helped the police identify another accused, a Hindutva activist from Maddur, who was the alleged gunrunner in the murder of the journalist.
According to the indictment, Shabbir sold an airgun to a co-worker of K T Naveen Kumar, who asked him to practice for another assassination the gun had planned. Police said his arrest thwarted a plan to kill writer KS Bhagwan. 37-year-old Naveen was a gun smuggler in the Gauri murder case. Naveen, the founder of an organization called Hindu Yuva Sene, was arrested by the police before planning to kill K S Bhagwan. However, further investigation indicated that he was not only involved in the Gauri’s assassination, but also part of the wider Hindutva terror network involved in the assassinations of leftist thinkers Govind Pansare and Narendra Dabholkar.
On Thursday, a witness detailed the journalist's whereabouts before she was killed. According to the News Minute, defense lawyers attempted to distance the Hindutva groups from the case, implying that the journalist angered the Naxal groups by facilitating the surrender of some ultras.
On Friday, defense lawyers continued cross-examination of a witness who was employed with the journalist (whose names were withheld as per court instructions). The Karnataka Organized Crime Control Act (KCOCA) special court adjourned the case to August 8 after taking nine witnesses’ statements. The trial will continue until August 13.
The Karnataka police alleged that the perpetrators were members of a criminal syndicate with links to the right-wing Hindu organization Sanatan Sanstha. The suspects were also linked to the killings of scholars Narendra Dabholkar and M. M. Kalburgi. The criminal syndicate targeted people they considered “anti-Hindu”.
The Coalition For Women In Journalism demands a fair judgment for the murder case of Gauri Lankesh. The journalist was an outspoken critic in India and she was killed because of her criticism. Five years of awaited trial eventually began and should shed a light on all covered murders and the perpetrators should be convicted with the highest level of charges.
The Coalition For Women In Journalism is a global organization of support for women journalists. The CFWIJ pioneered mentorship for mid-career women journalists across several countries around the world and is the first organization to focus on the status of free press for women journalists. We thoroughly document cases of any form of abuse against women in any part of the globe. Our system of individuals and organizations brings together the experience and mentorship necessary to help female career journalists navigate the industry. Our goal is to help develop a strong mechanism where women journalists can work safely and thrive.
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