26/11: Fishing boat used in attacks returned to owner

Mumbai, Feb 15 (PTI) The fishing trawler allegedly used
by terrorists to enter Indian waters for carrying out the
November 26 terror strikes has been returned to its owner by
the police after a local court here granted permission.

The owner of the vessel, Vinod Masani, based in Porbander
in western state of Gujarat had applied to a magistrate's
court seeking that the vessel be returned to him.

The police had said they had no objection to the boat
being returned, Additional Public Prosecutor E B Dhamal said.

"After instructing the owner not to sell the boat as it
could be used as evidence in the cases pending against
arrested terrorist Mohammed Ajmal Amir Kasab, the possession
of the boat was handed over to Masani on Friday," he told PTI.

The Kuber with a crew of five Indian fishermen on board
was allegedly hijacked by Pakistani vessel Al Husseini in
international waters on November 23 last and the crew, barring
the captain, were offloaded.

The vessel was then boarded by the ten terrorists who
sailed to within a few nautical miles off Mumbai, killed
captain Ajay Singh Solanki and launched a rubber dinghy to
land on the city's shores.

"Our investigations as far as the boat is concerned are
over as all forensic evidence have been collected," Joint
Commissioner of Police (Crime) Rakesh Maria said.

"Masani is expected to return to Gujarat with the boat
on Monday and there has been no evidence found of any kind of
wrong doing by the owner of the vessel," Maria said.

There was also no evidence found against the crew of the
sister vessel of the Kuber, 'Maa', of having done anything
illegal, he said.

During the course of investigations into the attack, the
police had recovered DNA samples from some articles on the
boat which were found to match that of sole arrested terrorist
Mohammed Ajmal Amir Kasab.

Some tests are still on to confirm that the nine other
slain terrorists had travelled aboard the fishing vessel.

"There were some tests which did not yield conclusive
results, but we are expecting the results of other forensic
tests soon," Maria said.

Investigators had also recovered evidence like a
satellite phone, a Global Positioning System device and
rations marked as being manufactured in Pakistan which were
listed in the dossier submitted to the Pakistani Government by
the Indian authorities.

Questions had been raised about how the fishing vessel
had ventured far into international waters and antecedents of
the captain of the vessel, Solanki. However, police had said
they found no evidence of Solanki's connivance in the
conspiracy to carry out the attacks. PTI AG
PMR
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