Salman Khan relieved from charges related to Black Buck case

The Bollywood star Salman Khan is acquitted by the Rajasthan High Court in the 1998 Blackbuck and Chinkara poaching cases.

The High Court acquitted the actor owing to “a lack of conclusive evidence” linking him with two separate incidents of poaching. “He (Salman) has been acquitted in both the cases by the high court”, the actor’s counsel Hastimal Saraswat said.

If we dig the past again, the 50-year-old actor had been accused of shooting the protected antelopes (Chikankaris) in two separate incidents in Rajasthan while he was filming the movie, in the year 1998.

Salman Khan was allegedly involved in poaching of two blackbucks near Jodhpur in the intervening night of 1-2 October, 1998. The actor did not attend the court session on July 25. “So, the statements of Dulani could not be considered”, said the court.

To bolster the argument that Salman was framed, the defence said the forest department had seized his weapon from Mumbai and then brought it down to Jodhpur. Also, it was argued that the pellets produced belonged to air gun, which has no capacity at all to kill an animal.

What also weakened the prosecution’s case was that 10 of a total 12 accused had already received the benefit of doubt. However, the government has chose to move to the Supreme Court to fight against this verdict of the High Court to get the proper judgement in the hit and run case.

Varun shares a very close bond with the superstar which date back to the times when Salman had worked with Varun’s father David Dhawan in multiple films. Three appeals by the state government are pending in these cases. A post on an unverified page of actress Renuka Shahane on Facebook censured the judgment raising questions like “Who killed the black buck and the chinkaras?”.

Since he has been acquitted of all charges by the High court, the appeal before the SC will have to be a strong one.