Second prosecution witness in the 1996  black buck hunting case today identified actresses Sonali Bendre, Neelam and Tabu in a court here. "The next prosecution witness, Mangilal, also recognised Sonali Bendre, Tabu and Neelam in the court today during examination," Assistant Public Prosecutor Praveen Verma said.

Yesterday, prosecution witness Sheraram had recognised them in the court. Both the villagers had claimed to have chased the vehicle in which the actors were going to hunt the antelope. The actresses appeared in the court of Chief Judicial Magistrate (Rural) today for the identification.

"Mangilal narrated the same description as that of Sheraram on Tuesday," said Verma. Mangilal told the court that both he and Sheraram had chased the vehicle, with Salman Khan, Saif Ali Khan and the three actresses were on board for hunting the black buck.

"His statements matched with those given by him to the forest officials during investigation in 1998," Verma said. After the examination of Mangilal, cross examination of the previous witness, Sehraram, was resumed by the counsel of Salman Khan.

"We will continue the cross examination on Thursday," said H M Saraswat, Khan's counsel. Meanwhile, the counsel of Khan withdrew the application moved in the High Court seeking permission to club the two cases against the actor, one under Wildlife Act and other under Arms Act.

In his application, Khan had said that since the trial in the Arms Act case has neared conclusion while it is yet to begin in the poaching case, in which the arms with expired licence had allegedly been used by Khan.

"Our plea was that to stay the trial of the Arms Act case, which had begun on January 29 in the CJM court until the case under Wildlife Act also reached the stage of trial.

"So that the trial of both the cases could go simultaneously, thereby doing away with any chance of judgement in the former case affecting the trial of the later one," said his counsel Hasti Mal Saraswat.

The same plea of clubbing the two cases has been rejected by a lower court and the District & Session Court earlier. The ground for this plea was that both the cases were linked to each other