Epilogue Press

EPILOGUE PRESS
New Delhi: A special court in Ahmedabad on Tuesday death sentence 11 persons to death and awarded life sentence to 20 others convicted in connection with the 2002 Godhra train burning case.

Designated judge PR Patel hearing the case inside the Sabarmati Central Jail had, last week, convicted 31 people of criminal conspiracy in burning of the S6 coach and murder and acquitted 63 others, including the main accused Maulvi Umarji, for the want of concrete evidence in connection with the case.

The prosecution had sought death penalty for all those convicted.

The 2002 Godhra train burning incident left 59 people dead and triggered communal violence in Gujarat that had claimed the lives of over 1200 people.

Kar Sevaks were returning from Ayodhya on board the Sabarmati Express.

Scientific evidence, statement of witnesses, circumstantial and documentary evidence placed on record have formed the basis of the judgement.

The trial conducted inside the Sabarmati Central Jail here began in June 2009 with the framing of charges against 94 accused in the carnage.

Two different panels appointed to inquire into the 2002 case had given different views on the Godhra train burning incident.

The Nanavati Commission, appointed by the Gujarat government to probe the carnage, had in the first part of the report concluded that the fire in the S6 coach was not an accident, but it was caused by throwing petrol inside it.

The burning of the coach S6 was a pre-planned act. In other words there was a conspiracy to burn the coach of the train coming from Ayodhya and to cause harm to the ‘karsevaks’ travelling in it,” the report submitted to the government in September 2008 had said.

The one-man UC Banerjee Commission appointed by the Railway Ministry under Lalu Prasad Yadav had said that fire was “accidental”.