The Supreme Court on Tuesday has granted bail to four convicts – Umeshbhai Bharwad, Rajkumar, Harshad and Prakashbhai Rathod- in Naroda Patiya case of 2002 when 97 people were killed during riots in Gujarat.
2002 Naroda Patiya case: Supreme Court grants bail to four convicts – Umeshbhai Bharwad, Rajkumar, Harshad and Prakashbhai Rathod
— ANI (@ANI) January 23, 2019
A Supreme Court bench headed by Justice AM Khanwilkar granted bail to four convicts on the ground that the High Court verdict of conviction was “debatable” and that they should be released on bail since their appeal hearing would take time. While One convict was granted temporary bail for his daughter’s wedding.
The Gujarat High Court had in June last year convicted Bajrang Dal leader Babu Bajrangi and others for rigorous imprisonment, observing that their punishment must be consistent with the brutality of the crime. The high court had convicted 16 people, including Babu Bajrangi, and acquitted 18 others, among them former BJP minister Maya Kodnani.
“The court cannot set aside the agony and anguish of the victims… Offences are not against individuals but society at large and has consequences of polarising society,” the high court had said on June 25″. The Court added, “that any liberal attitude with respect to such offences would be “counter-productive” and “against the interest of society.”
The killings in the Ahmedabad locality was one of the worst attacks of the 2002 post-Godhra riots.
On February 28 2002, 97 people from the Muslim community — mostly migrants from Karnataka and Maharashtra — were killed by a mob. The locality with nearly 800 houses was set on fire. The massacre had taken place a day after the torching of the Sabarmati Express at Godhra, which had triggered state-wide riots.
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