Special court convicts 24 in 2002 Gulberg society massacre

A special SIT court, on Thursday, convicted 24 people in connection with the Gulberg Society massacre case in which 69 persons including former Congress MP Ehsan Jafri were killed a day after the 2002 Godhra train burning incident.

Special Court Judge P B Desai delivered this judgement eight months after the trial concluded on September 22, 2015. The final sentencing is expected to take place on 6 June. Of the 24 accused, the court found 11 people guilty of murder including VHP leader Atul Vaid.

The Supreme Court, which is monitoring the case, had earlier directed the SIT court to pronounce its verdict by May 31.There were 66 accused named by the SIT in the case, of which nine have been behind bars for the last 14 years, while others are out on bail. The court has acquitted 36 among the 66 accused, including a former police inspector.

One of the accused, Bipin Patel is a sitting BJP corporator from Asarva seat. He was also the corporator in 2002 when the massacre happened and won the election for the fourth consecutive term last year.

Last week, the court had turned down pleas moved by two accused -- Narayan Tank and Babu Rathod -- to conduct narco-analysis and brain mapping tests on them to prove their innocence. The court maintained that it was not required when the verdict was imminent.

During the trial, the riots victim's lawyer had argued that the massacre was a pre-planned criminal conspiracy hatched by the accused to kill minority community members of the Gulberg Society.

The defence had refuted the conspiracy theory of prosecution and claimed that the mob resorted to violence only after slain Congress MP Eshan Jafri fired several rounds on them.

The Gulberg Society case is one of the nine cases related to the 2002 Gujarat riots being probed by the Supreme Court-appointed SIT.