Mecca Masjid accused protection worries AP

Authorities of Hyderabad's Chanchalguda Central Jail have expressed their inability to provide necessary protection to two members of Hindu militant organisation.

The prime suspects in the Mecca Masjid blast case are Devender Gupta and Lokesh Sharma. 

The two, who were shifted from Ajmer to Hyderabad, and produced in the court by the Central Bureau of Investigation were remanded in two weeks' judicial custody and sent to Chanchalguda jail on the specific request of the CBI on the ground that they will face a threat from the Muslim fundamentalist prisoners in Charalapally central jail.

But, after the 14th additional chief metropolitan magistrate ordered them to be taken to Chanchalguda jail, the jail superintendent C Chandrasekhar moved another petition in the court requesting that they be shifted to another jail.

The court had ordered the prison authorities that Devender Gupta and Lokesh Sharma be kept in high security barracks.

Superintendent told the court that as Chanchalguda jail does not have high security barracks, they be shifted to another jail.
Gupta and Sharma spent their first night in Chanchalguda jail in two separate cells.

Apart from Chanchalguda jail in old city, Hyderabad has only Charalapally Central Jail in the outskirts of the city where quite a few prisoners with Muslim fundamentalist background are lodged.

According to the CBI sources, they were going to move the court for the custody of Gupta and Sharma to question them about Mecca Masjid blast. The CBI will also conduct an identification parade of the two.

In another development, senior criminal lawyer and head of the state BJP's legal cell N Ramchandra Rao will represent Gupta and Sharma in the case. His juniors have already filed a wakalatnama informing the court that Rao will be defending the accused. Rao told the media that the CBI has brought the duo only on suspicion of links with Mecca Masjid blast, but no chargesheet has been filed as yet.

BJP leader's move to defend the Abhinav Bharat's members in a terror-related case has come as a surprise to observers because the RSS has already announced that it will not extend any support or assistance to the accused in terror cases, even if any one of them happens to be the member of RSS.