Mohammed Arif Din Mohammed Shaikh, Shakil Ismail Khan and Iqbal Dastagir Shaikh were tried by the court and acquitted from all charges as the only independent witness in the case, Rai's telephone operator, turned hostile to the prosecution case.

Two of the accused in the case, Ajay Pawar and Sunil Khusalkar, were killed soon after the incident in a police encounter at Opera House, while five other accused Chinchu, Vijay, Babu, Ramu and Abu Salem are absconding.According to the prosecution case, Rai had received threats from the Abu Salem gang in June 1997 and was asked to pay a sum of Rs 20 crore, failing which he and his family members would be eliminated. Rai then sought protection from Mumbai police and was provided with a constable armedwith a carbine since July 12, 1997. On the day of the incident, July 31, Rai was accompanied by the complainant in the case, police constable Mohan Singh, who was then attached to the special operations squad.

Singh had accompanied Rai from his Napean Sea Road residence to his office at Commerce Centre, Tardeo. While Rai went inside his office cabin, Singh was seated outside near the telephone operator Dilip Dhavale. At around 4.40 pm, Mohammed Arif Shaikh DIG, who was in his house a couple of hundred yards away, heard the gunshots, he alerted a few other officers on the phone. The DIG then walked up to the housing cluster. He was shot in the head from the first-floor window, where the militants had apparently taken position.

A sub inspector who had taken one of the injured away foR medical treatment was shot when he returned to the block. Another officer's body was found only the next morning, as a cordon operation was set into motion. By then the militants had taken over the two-storey block of fourflats.

After sunrise yesterday, there was intermittent firing. There was a shoot-out around noon when an escaping militant was shot dead. Around 5 pm, the NSG arrived at the campus, and two-and-half hours later took charge of the operations.

At 9.30 pm, the NSG men were fired at from the housing block. There was more firing around midnight, and again around 5.30 this morning. Around 1.30 am, the NSG commandos mounted the rescue operation, firing at the roof of the building and simultaneously pulling out the hostages. The commandos climbed up ladders to pull the hostages out. Asked how the militant did not end up shooting at the hostages when the operation was on, Mangat said the heavy firing was meant to divert his attention.

An NSG officer was fired at when the commandos tried to enter the building after the hostages were evacuated. Three rockets were then fired into the building from a rocket-launcher which the NSG borrowed from other security forces.

Later, while combing the area, the BSF recovereda grenade-launcher and a dozen rocket-propelled grenades left behind by the militants from a ditch. One of the militants had apparently scribbled Lashkar-e-Toiba on a wall.With the officers avoiding the press in Srinagar and Bandipore for two days, rumours did the rounds. Yesterday, reporters were barred from travelling on the Sopore-Bandipore road. And for hours, reporters camped at the gate of the BSF complex at Maddar with no official offering to brief them.