17 years later, Malegaon bomb blast case trial finally ends; NIA special court reserves verdict for May 8

A special National Investigation Agency (NIA) court on Saturday reserved the Malegaon blast case verdict for May 8, a PTI report said.

The verdict was reserved following the completion of trial, almost 17 years after it shook the town in Maharashtra's Nashik district. Six people were killed and over 100 injured when an explosive device strapped on a motorcycle went off near a mosque in Malegaon, a town about 200 km from Mumbai, on September 29, 2008.

Accused in the Malegaon bomb blast case

During the course of trial, the prosecution had examined 323 prosecution witnesses, of which 34 had turned hostile. Lieutenant Colonel Prasad Purohit, BJP leader Pragya Singh Thakur, Major Ramesh Upadhyay (retired), Ajay Rahirkar, Sudhakar Dwivedi, Sudhakar Chaturvedi and Sameer Kulkarni are facing trial under Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA) and the Indian Penal Code (IPC).

In April last year, a special NIA court had asked the Mumbai NIA team to reach out to the agency's Bhopal team to physically verify the health of Thakur.

The court had allowed her exemption based on the medical reports. However, observing that her absence in recording the CrPC 313 statement was obstructing the court proceedings and delaying the trial, the court had asked the investigation agency to file a detailed report about her health.

Sadhvi Pragya Singh Thakur was arrested by Maharashtra ATS in 2008 in connection with the case.

History of the case

While the case was initially being probed by the Maharashtra Anti-Terror Squad (ATS), it was later transferred to the NIA in 2011. In 2016, the NIA had filed a chargesheet, giving a clean chit to Thakur and three other accused – Shyam Sahu, Praveen Takalki and Shivnarayan Kalsangra.

The NIA had said that it did not find any evidence against them and they should be discharged from the case. However, the NIA court had ruled that Thakur will face trial, and the rest – Sahu, Takalki, and Kalsangra – were absolved from the case.

Charges against the accused

The special court, on October 30, 2018, framed charges against seven accused under the stringent UAPA and IPC. They are facing trial under sections 16 (committing terrorist act) and 18 (conspiring to commit terrorist act) of the UAPA and under IPC sections 120 (b) (criminal conspiracy), 302 (murder), 307 (attempt to murder), 324 (voluntarily causing hurt) and 153 (a) (promoting enmity between two religious groups).

Recording of the testimony of the prosecution witness was completed in September last year.

(With PTI inputs)