CL Patil (left) and Salim Shaikh (right) have exposed the Sanatan Sanstha's alleged nexus with powerbrokers.

Journalist Gauri Lankesh, scholars Govind Pansare, MM Kalburgi and rationalist Narendra Dabholkar could have been alive today.

They are dead because political pressure saved the suspect Sanatan Sanstha from a potential ban nine years ago, investigators probing the Goa-based organization have revealed to India Today TV.

In 2009, two of the sanstha's alleged sadhaks were killed when a bomb they were trying to plant at Goa's Margao exploded prematurely. The attack, aimed at Goa's pre-Diwali Narakasur festival, was planned to stir communal tensions, prosecutors said.

Senior police and anti-terrorism squad (ATS) officers, who probed the Sanatan Sanstha for its alleged role in the Margao blast, told India Today TV reporters that their investigation was hampered by "political pressure".

"There is political pressure. Had there been no political pressure, it would have been banned long back," said CL Patil, the then station house officer (SHO) in Ponda, where the sanstha is headquartered.

He also recounted how his own proposal to ban the outfit was eventually rejected.

"Why did you move the file for a ban? On what grounds?" asked India Today TV's investigative reporter.

"The incident that happened in Margao...there have been several other incidents as well...There have been 7-9 cases against them in Maharashtra," he recalled. "Organisations that are disturbing communal disharmony should be shut down. This is what I wrote [in the file]. We also pointed out the cases against them in Maharashtra," Patil said.

According to the former Ponda SHO, his recommendation came back without action.

"What I precisely recommended was that it should be banned at least in Goa as it's a peaceful state. I sent it [the recommendation] to my deputy SP. He, in turn, sent it to the DGP, but it came back," Patil said.

"Where did it come back from?" the reporter asked.

"It kept moving back and forth and one fine day an officer came in and said it should not move," Patil said.

Read part one of the expose on Sanatan Sanstha here | Exclusive: Video tapes reveal how Sanatan Sanstha workers planted bombs

He insisted all that happened under pressure from a powerful politician in Goa.

"It's a highly political thing. No one can go inside [the sanstha], police included. No inquiries are done there. Everybody falls silent in the name of religion. Everybody fears god. The ministry and the law enforcement are both involved," he claimed.

Patil named a high-profile leader from Goa's ruling coalition, who he said had family connections with the Sanatan Sanstha.

For now, India Today TV is withholding the identity of the politician from Goa's ruling coalition, pending clarification from the Manohar Parrikar government about that leader's possible role in the sanstha investigations.

"His [the politician's] wife is a manager of the sanstha. She runs it. His sister-in-law also runs it," Patil said.

Around a dozen suspects have been arrested so far in connection with the murder of Gauri Lankesh in September last year.

Amit Degvekar is one of them. India Today TV accessed copies of his voter ID and bank receipts, which show the Sanatan headquarters in Ponda, Goa as his residential address.

But Patil elaborated on Degvekar's sinister links with the Margao blast accused, Malgonda Patil, who had died while planting the bombs nine years ago.

The officer told India Today TV that the suspect in the Lankesh murder and Malgonda Patil shared the same room, next to the Sanatan Sanstha founder Jayant Athavale's, at the organisation's main base in Ponda.

"Degvekar, who has recently been arrested, and the man who died [in the Margao blast] shared a room next to Athavale. The room was separated by a thin wall and passage inside. Who was brainwashing them? He was a room partner. Why was he not taken in for investigation? Why was he spared? Why was his role not verified? Had he been arrested there and then, he would not have gone on to murder Gauri Lankesh. These murders would not have happened at least," Patil said.

"We sent the proposal. Had it been banned in 2009-10, these 4-5 murders would not have taken place," he added.

Salim Shaikh, an ATS inspector in Goa, also spoke about the sanstha's alleged nexus with powerbrokers.

He admitted that the family of a powerful politician stonewalled a ban on the Sanatan Sanstha.

"All their activities are underground here but they have a lot of active political support," he said. "His [the leader's] wife is a very active member of the sanstha, extremely active. Not now but since long. We sent the proposal to ban [the group]. It was rejected. It didn't reach the government," Shaikh added.

CBI investigators suspect that several sadhaks involved in planning the Margao blast in 2009 -- now absconding -- are involved in the murders of Lankesh in 2017, Pansare and Kalburgi in 2015 and of Dabholkar in 2013.

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