MUMBAI: The National Investigation Agency on Friday contended that there were three " conspiracy meetings '' at Bhopal, Faridabad and Nashik which establish Lt Col Prasad Purohit 's role in 2008 Malegaon blast While opposing his bail plea, Sandesh Patil, counsel for NIA, however told the high court, that two witnesses resiled from their statement to the ATS of having seen him at the meetings, and two others moved the state human rights body alleging they were tortured and a statement extracted from them.Patil pointed to a witness at the Nashik meeting who said Shankaracharya, Purohit and one more accused had spoked of terror acts. He read out from a transcript found on a laptop of the accused Shankaracharya at the Faridabad meeting. It spoke of them talking about "establishment of Hindu rashtra,'' said Patil.In Bhopal there was an indoor closed door meeting, said Patil adding that while the ATS had examined two witnesses, when the NIA re-examined them, they said that Sadhvi and Purohit were never present. Patil said when asked why had they mentioned their presence to the ATS, the two witnesses told NIA that they were "threatened with dire consequences and coerced into giving that statement by the ATS.''But when a bench of Justices Ranjit More and Shalini Phansalkar Joshi asked what was the stand of NIA on Purohit, Patil said the agency was opposing his bail plea on merits. The hearing concluded and the court has reserved the matter for orders now.

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