A special SIT court in Ahmedabad on Thursday convicted 24 of the 66 accused including a VHP leader in the 2002 post-Godhra Gulberg society massacre, which left 69 people including former Congress MP Ehsan Jafri dead.
Special Court Judge PB Desai acquitted 36 others including sitting BJP corporator Bipin Patel and also dropped the conspiracy charge (120 B) against all the accused.
Congress corporator Meghsinh Chaudhari and K G Erda, then police inspector of the area under which the Gulberg Society was located, are among those acquitted.
The court said that there is no evidence of criminal conspiracy in the case, while dropping section 120 B of the IPC. 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.
Of the 24 convicted, 11 have been charged with murder, while other 13 have been convicted for lesser offences.
@Agency report.
