Mumbai : The stage is set for Bollywood superstar Salman Khan’s plea for bail and appeal against his five-year jail term in the September 2002 accident case before the Bombay High Court on Friday.
The actor’s pleas will come up before Justice A.M. Thipsay who granted him interim bail for two days on medical and other grounds on Wednesday, soon after his conviction and sentencing by a lower court.
After getting the voluminous 240-page judgement, Salman’s case for bail and appeal against the lower court ruling will be argued by senior Supreme Court counsel Harish Salve and Shrikant Shivade.
However, Salman who has been on bail for nearly 13 years, is not likely to be present in the court on Friday.
The interim bail had come hours after Salman was found guilty and subsequently sentenced to five years in jail, plus a fine of Rs.25,000 by Additional Sessions Judge D. W. Deshpande, who had pronounced him guilty on all the prosecution charges, including culpable homicide not amounting to murder, rash and drunken driving, driving without a valid licence and other laws.
The ruling came in the 13-year old accident case when Salman’s Toyota Land Cruiser rammed into a bakery in Bandra west, in the early hours of September 28, 2002, killing one pavement dweller and injuring four others, a short distance from his sea-facing home in Galaxy Apartments.
Salman’s team of lawyers, including Salve and Shivade moved the high court and secured the interim relief.
The hearing would be crucial for the actor since it is the final working day of the high court before it goes for annual summer vacations till June 8.