Advocate Shahid Nadeem who represented the victims mentioned they are going to file an impartial attraction earlier than the Bombay Excessive Courtroom after reviewing the judgement. “.. the victims proceed to undergo from the trauma they expertise, and the particular NIA courtroom's choice to grant the accused the advantage of the doubt signifies the company's incapability to prose cute successfully,” Nadeem mentioned.
Particular Choose AK Lahoti, delivering the decision, mentioned the prosecution had “did not show the case” and that the accused “deserved the advantage of doubt.” “There was a grave incident in opposition to society,” the decide famous, “however the courtroom can not convict merely on ethical grounds.”
Whereas acquitting Sadhvi Pragya Thakur, the courtroom held there was no credible proof to ascertain that she owned the bike allegedly used within the blast. It additionally famous that she had renounced materials possessions and adopted a religious life two years earlier than the incident. “The serial variety of the chassis was not utterly recovered by the forensic specialists and, due to this fact, the prosecution did not show that the bike belonged to her,” the courtroom noticed. On Purohit, the courtroom mentioned that it discovered no proof that he sourced RDX or assembled the explosive.
The courtroom additionally cleared the Hindu rightwing outfit Abhinav Bharat of any involvement, stating there was no proof linking the group to terrorist exercise. “There isn't any proof that Abhinav Bharat was used for terror exercise. Materials witnesses haven't supported the prosecution case. The prosecution has been unsuccessful in proving the conferences befell (for conspiracy),” the courtroom mentioned.
The case was initially probed by the Maharashtra Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS), which named 11 accused and three absconders beneath the Maharashtra Management of Organised Crime Act (MCOCA), attributing the assault to Abhinav Bharat. In 2011, the probe was transferred to the NIA, which registered a contemporary case beneath the Illegal Actions (Prevention) Act (UAPA) and MCOCA. Throughout its investigation, the company flagged critical discrepancies within the ATS's proof, calling the sooner probe riddled with gaps and inconsistencies.
A supplementary chargesheet filed by the NIA in 2016 named ten people, together with Purohit and Main Ramesh Upadhyaya. Nonetheless, costs in opposition to Sadhvi Pragya and three others had been dropped for lack of proof. Over the course of the trial, 323 prosecution witnesses and eight defence witnesses had been examined. The courtroom reviewed greater than 10,800 paperwork and 400 seized articles. Almost 40 prosecution witnesses turned hostile.
