Thane: A court in Thane has acquitted eight men charged with the attempted murder of a police constable, citing the victim’s inability to identify his attackers and the fact that key prosecution witnesses turned hostile.In her judgment delivered on April 6, additional sessions judge, V L Bhosale, gave the benefit of doubt to the eight men, observing the prosecution had failed to prove its case beyond reasonable doubt. According to the prosecution, constable Bhaskar Sonavane was assaulted with sticks and beer bottles outside a bar in the city’s Upvan area on April 21, 2016. The court noted the constable himself could not identify “any of the accused as the assailants since the incident occurred at nighttime and he lost consciousness after being struck on the head”. The attack was a fallout of a dispute between the hotel management and a customer named Kamlesh, whose brother Arun led 10 to 15 persons to the site. Sonavane, who was at the spot to meet an informant, suffered a skull fracture and brain injuries in the attack. The court noted that the hotel partner Rajesh Shetty and manager Naveen Gouda, who was the original complainant, both turned hostile.
