2008 Malegaon blast case: All accused, including Pragya Thakur, acquitted
What's the story
A special National Investigation Agency (NIA) court in Mumbai has acquitted all seven accused in the 2008 Malegaon blast case. The verdict was pronounced by Judge AK Lahoti on Thursday. Among those acquitted are former Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MP Sadhvi Pragya Singh Thakur and Lieutenant Colonel Prasad Purohit. The court found that while a blast occurred in Malegaon, the prosecution failed to establish that it was caused by a motorcycle bomb.
Evidence issues
No sketch of spot made during _panchnama_
The court also noted several lapses in the investigation. "No sketch of the spot was done by the investigation officer while doing the panchnama. No fingerprint, dump data or anything else was collected for the spot. The samples were contaminated, so the reports...are not reliable," it said. The motorcycle allegedly used in the blast also did not have a clear chassis number, and the prosecution could not prove that it was in Pragya's possession immediately before the blast, it added.
Case
What court said
Furthermore, the court stated that Thakur had become a sanyasi and had abandoned all earthly possessions two years before the blast. Regarding the charges against Lt. Col Purohit, the court determined that there was no evidence to show that he obtained RDX from Kashmir or assembled the device. The other accused in the case are Major (Retd) Ramesh Upadhyay Ajay Rahirkar Sudhakar Dwivedi Sudhakar Chaturvedi Sameer Kulkarni.
Legal proceedings
UAPA could not be invoked: Court
The court also observed that the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) could not be invoked as "sanction was not taken as per rules." It stated that both sanction orders under UAPA were defective. The case was initially probed by Maharashtra's Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS) before being handed over to the National Investigation Agency (NIA) in 2011. The trial began in 2018 and concluded on April 19, 2023.
Prosecution's plea
NIA sought commensurate punishment for accused
The NIA had sought "commensurate punishment" for the accused, arguing that the blast was aimed at terrorizing a section of the Muslim community and threatening internal security. The prosecution presented 323 witnesses during the trial, though 37 turned hostile. The blast took place on September 29, 2008 when a bomb strapped to a motorcycle exploded near a mosque in Malegaon during Ramadan. According to Indian Express, the timing of the blast just before Navratri was designed to foment communal rifts.