Daijiworld Media Network - Udupi (SP)

Udupi, Nov 24: The district and sessions court here has, through a judgment delivered on Monday November 23, absolved the accused of all the charges relating to the murder of a journalist who was running a weekly from the town. Hitendra Prasad, who was operating a weekly titled 'Hai Maruta', had been killed about nine years back.

Five persons, Saleem alias Manchi Saleem (34) from Alevoor Duglipadavu, Dinesh alias Mimmi from Kukkikatte Indiranagara, Ramesh alias Atte Ramesh (37), residing at Ammunje Road here, Sanjeev alias Manikanta (32) from Karamballi Janata Colony and Pitty Nagesh from Indiranagara, hsd been named as accused in the charge sheet filed in the court. Out of them, Dinesh died sometime back due to ill health, while Pitty Nagesh was hacked to death.

Judge of the court, Shivashankar B Amarannavar, said that it was decided to hold the accused not guilty as the allegations made against them were not supported by concrete proof and evidences.

The then police inspector of Manipal, Sanjeev Nayak, had conducted investigation and filed charge sheet in the court. The court had examined 27 witnesses including some journalists in the case. The accused were represented in the court by advocates, Ravikiran Murdeshwar and T Vijayakumar Shetty.