Witness identifies Kasab as gunman who killed brother

Mumbai, July 1(PTI) Emotional scenes were witnessed in
the court conducting the trial of 26/11 terror attack accused
Mohammed Ajmal Kasab Wednesday, when a witness broke down
while identifying him as the gunman who killed his brother.

Bharat Vaghela, who lives in a hut near the Cama Hospital
which was one of the sites of the terror attacks, broke down
as he said he had seen Kasab killing his brother.

"My brother has small children. Who will look after
them?" an emotional Vaghela said.

When asked by special judge M L Tahaliyani to regain
composure, Vaghela said, "I have seen with my own eyes this
man firing at my brother. How can I forget?"

However, Kasab did not react when identified by Vaghela.

Two other eyewitnesses, a nurse at Cama Hospital and a
photojournalist, also identified Kasab Wednesday as one of the
gunman involved in the terror strikes.

Vaghela said on the night of November 26 he was standing
outside his house talking to some friends when they saw two
persons approach from a distance who began shooting at them.

"I then rushed towards my hut, closed the door and told
my mother what had happened," he said.

Vaghela told Special Public Prosecutor Ujjwal Nikam
that by looking through a gap in the frame of the door he
could see Kasab standing outside his hut and firing at the
adjacent house where his brother Thakur lived.

"I heard cries from the hut and after some time both
gunmen went towards Cama Hospital. I came out and saw my
brother in a pool of blood and his five-year-old child was
crying," Vaghela said.

He said he rushed his brother to the J J Hospital
where he was declared brought dead. A friend Bhagan Shinde,
with whom he was talking earlier, was also brought to the same
hospital but was declared dead on arrival, Vaghela said.

The witness also refuted defence counsel Abbas Kazmi's
contention that he had not seen Kasab, saying that he had seen
the Pakistani gunman from close and firing a gun.

Another eyewitness, nurse Anjali Gulati working at the
Cama Hospital, said she had seen two persons enter the
hospital compound on November 26 night.

The taller of the two opened fire which resulted in
her assistant Heera Yadav sustaining bullet injuries in her
arm, Gulati told Special Public Prosecutor Ujjwal Nikam,
adding that she immediately reported it to the Chief Medical
Officer.

"I then rushed to my ward and closed the collapsible
doors. There were 20 persons in the ward and I shifted them to
the pantry because the ward had open windows on all sides and
it was highly risky to keep them there," she said.

"We could hear sound of firing and explosions for the
next two hours," Gulati said.

According to the prosecution, the two gunmen after
leaving CST entered the nearby Cama Hospital where they were
involved in a gun-fight with police personnel.

Kasab was laughing when Gulati described one of the
terrorists as being tall and the other short.

Gulati said she had earlier identified Kasab in an
identification parade conducted by the police.

"When I touched him to identify him, he said 'Aapne
sahi pehchana, main wohi Ajmal Kasab hoon.' (You have
recognised me correctly. I am the same Ajmal Kasab)", Gulati
said.

However, when asked by defence counsel Kazmi whether
this statement had been recorded at the time of the
identification parade, Gulati said she did not know. PTI