Witnesses’ account may be damning for actor.
By The American Bazaar Staff
MUMBAI: Two witnesses identified Bollywood superstar Salman Khan in a Mumbai court on Tuesday, during the re-trial of his 2002 hit-and-run incident that injured four people and killed one man.
During Tuesday’s court session, two witnesses identified Khan (48) as being the driver of a Toyota Land Cruiser that careened off the road on a sleepy September night 12 years ago, striking a number of people who were sleeping on the side of the road outside a bakery in Bandra. One witness even said that Khan was so intoxicated, he couldn’t even stand up straight when he got out of the car following the collision.
Khan, one of the biggest box office draws in Bollywood history, could find himself in jail for up to 10 years if convicted on charges of culpable homicide not amounting to murder.
Originally arrested in 2002, Khan was charged with rash and negligent driving. He was originally meant to be tried for a lesser offense of causing death by negligence, which only carries a maximum of two years behind bars. All charges pertaining to his culpable homicide were dropped for a decade, but resurfaced last summer when he was re-charged under the same offenses.
A new trial was ordered on December 5, and officially got underway April 29, just last week. With litigation well underway and testimonies now being heard in court, Khan’s future will be decided in the coming weeks. Prosecutors have submitted over 60 witnesses to be called during the trial, although they have said not all will actually take the stand.
Throughout the proceedings, Khan has maintained his innocence, and has argued that he was not operating the vehicle on the night in question, September 28. Last year, Khan and his associates even created a website, aimed to give fans and the media full transparency regarding the facts of the case by allowing court documents to be viewed free of charge.
But the eyewitness testimony may ultimately prove too damning to work around. According to the Jagran Post, one witness was even able to identify the license plate on the car responsible for the damage, as well as pieces of glass and other parts that came off of the car when it collided with a Laundromat just behind where the victims were sleeping.
Khan has not yet taken the stand himself, nor is it clear if and when he ever will. He is currently working on the film Kick, a remake of a 2009 Telugu film, which is set to release this coming Eid. He also has a number of other film projects in the pipeline, including a possible third chapter in his popular Dabangg series, which have now been jeopardized by his new trial.
Khan’s good friend and frequent co-star, Sanjay Dutt, was sent to jail last year to serve a five-year sentence for illegally possessing arms during the 1993 Mumbai terror attacks. That case was also tried and put away several years earlier, only to be brought back by the courts.
Khan also has charges pending related to an incident in 1998, in which he and a handful of co-stars from the film Hum Saath-Saath Hain allegedly shot and killed an endangered black buck (Chinkara). Saif Ali Khan, Sonali Bendre, Tabu, and Neelam also face charges of having egged Khan on to poach the animal.