Jodhpur, Feb 16 (IANS) The nearly three-decade-old 1998 Kankani blackbuck poaching case involving Bollywood actor Salman Khan witnessed a significant development on Monday after the Rajasthan High Court announced a change in the bench hearing the matter. ​

Justice Baljinder Singh Sandhu, who had been presiding over the appeals related to the case, recused himself from further hearing.​

Following his decision to step aside, the matter will now be placed before a newly constituted bench for continued proceedings. ​

The High Court had been scheduled to hear simultaneously Salman Khan’s criminal appeal challenging his 2018 conviction and five-year sentence, along with the Rajasthan government’s leave to appeal against the acquittal of the co-accused in the same case. ​

Earlier, Justice Manoj Kumar Garg had directed that both matters be tagged and listed together to ensure that they were adjudicated simultaneously. ​

However, due to procedural developments and the recent recusal, the hearing will now continue before a different bench once the matter is formally reassigned and relisted.​

The case dates back to 1998, during the shooting of the Hindi film Hum Saath-Saath Hain near Kankani village in Jodhpur district. Salman Khan and his co-actors were accused of hunting two blackbucks, a species protected under the Wildlife (Protection) Act, 1972. ​

On April 5, 2018, the Chief Judicial Magistrate Court in Jodhpur convicted Salman Khan and sentenced him to five years’ imprisonment. He was later granted bail and subsequently challenged the conviction before the Rajasthan High Court. ​

In the same 2018 judgment, the trial court acquitted the co-accused, including Saif Ali Khan, Sonali Bendre, Tabu, Neelam, and Dushyant Singh, granting them the benefit of the doubt due to insufficient evidence. ​

The Rajasthan government thereafter filed a leave petition seeking permission to challenge their acquittal. In previous proceedings, Salman Khan had also moved a transfer plea requesting that both his appeal and the state government’s appeal be heard together to avoid conflicting judgments.​

The High Court had accepted this request and ordered that the matters be listed jointly. With Justice Sandhu’s recusal, the case now awaits allocation to a new bench, which will determine the schedule for further hearings. ​

The latest development adds another chapter to one of Rajasthan’s most high-profile criminal cases, which has remained under judicial scrutiny for nearly three decades. ​

The fresh bench of the Rajasthan High Court will now decide the course of the appeals in the coming hearings.

–IANS

arc/dan