Salman home firing: Accused denied bail
Salman Khan
's residence last year saying the accused cannot escape MCOCA provisions merely because there are no criminal antecedents against him.
The bail plea of accused Sonu Chander alias Sonukumar Bishnoi was rejected by Maharashtra Control of Organized Crime Act Judge Mahesh Jadhav on Friday, details of which were made available on Monday. The special court held that evidence clearly demonstrates Chander along with other accused and leader of the Bishnoi gang hatched the conspiracy to kill the victim. pti
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Mint
an hour ago
- Mint
Malegaon blasts case timeline: Here's how things unfolded from 2008 as ex-BJP MP Pragya Thakur and six others acquitted
A special NIA court in Mumbai on Thursday acquitted all seven accused in the 2008 Malegaon blast case, stating that the prosecution failed to prove the charges beyond reasonable doubt. Those cleared of all charges include former MP Sadhvi Pragya Singh Thakur, retired Major Ramesh Upadhyay, Sudhakar Chaturvedi, Ajay Rahirkar, Sudhankar Dhar Dwivedi (also known as Shankaracharya), and Sameer Kulkarni. 'All bail bonds stand cancelled and sureties are discharged,' the court said in its order. The court also directed the Maharashtra government to pay compensation of ₹ 2 lakh each to the families of those killed in the blast and ₹ 50,000 each to those who were injured. The blast took place on September 29 2008, when an explosive device attached to a motorcycle went off near a mosque in Bhikku Chowk, Malegaon. Six people lost their lives, and 95 others were injured in the explosion. Initially, 11 people were named as accused in the case, but charges were ultimately framed against only seven of them. September 29, 2008: A bomb planted on a motorcycle goes off at Malegaon in Maharashtra's Nashik district. Six persons killed and 101 injured. September 30, 2008: An FIR is lodged at Azad Nagar Police station in Malegaon. October 21, 2008: Maharashtra's Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS) takes over the probe into the case. October 23, 2008: ATS makes first arrests in the case. Sadhvi Pragya Singh Thakur and three others arrested. ATS claims the blast was carried out by right wing extremists. November 2008: Lt Col Prasad Purohit arrested by ATS for his alleged involvement in the conspiracy of the blast. January 20, 2009: ATS files charge-sheet against 11 arrested accused, including Pragya Thakur and Purohit before special court. Accused are charged under the stringent provisions of the Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act (MCOCA), Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA) and Indian Penal Code (IPC). Two persons - Ramji alias Ramchandra Kalsangra and Sandeep Dange are shown as wanted accused. July 2009: Special court says provisions of MCOCA are not applicable in the case and the accused shall be tried by a court in Nashik. August 2009: Maharashtra government moves Bombay High Court in appeal against special court order. July 2010: Bombay High Court overturns special court order and upholds the charges under MCOCA. August 2010: Purohit and Pragya Singh Thakur move Supreme Court against HC order. February 1, 2011: ATS Mumbai arrests another person - Pravin Mutalik. A total of 12 persons arrested by then. April 13, 2011: National Investigation Agency (NIA) takes over the case. February and December 2012: NIA arrests two more persons - Lokesh Sharma and Dhan Singh Chaudhary. Total arrests 14 by then. April 2015: Supreme Court sends back case to special court for reconsideration of applicability of MCOCA. February 2016: NIA tells special court that it has taken the Attorney General's opinion on whether provisions of MCOCA can be applied in the case. May 13, 2016: NIA files charge-sheet before special court. Drops MCOCA charges from the case. Gives clean chit to seven accused. April 25, 2017: Bombay High court grants bail to Pragya Thakur. HC refuses bail to Purohit. September 21, 2017: Purohit gets bail from the Supreme Court. By the end of the year, all arrested accused out on bail. December 27, 2017: Special NIA court discharges accused Shivnarayan Kalsangra, Shyam Sahu and Praveen Mutalik Naik from the case. Court also drops charges related to being members of a terrorist organisation and raising funds for terrorist acts under the UAPA. October 30, 2018: Charges framed against seven accused - Thakur, Purohit, Ramesh Upadhyay, Sameer Kulkarni, Ajay Rahirkar, Sudhakar Dwivedi and Sudhakar Chaturvedi. They face trial under UAPA for committing a terrorist act, and under IPC for criminal conspiracy and murder. December 3, 2018: Trial begins with the examination of first witness in the case. September 14, 2023: After examining 323 prosecution witnesses (of which 37 turned hostile), prosecution decides to close its evidence. July 23 ,2024: Examination of defence witnesses (eight) completed. August 12, 2024: Special court records final statements of accused under section 313 of Criminal Procedure Code. Matter posted for final arguments of prosecution and defence. April 19, 2025: Special court closes trial for judgment. July 31, 2025: Special NIA Judge A K Lahoti acquits all seven accused, including Thakur and Purohit, noting there was no "cogent and reliable" evidence to warrant conviction. Court says the prosecution has failed to prove its case beyond reasonable doubt.
New Indian Express
2 hours ago
- New Indian Express
'High degree of suspicion established, not enough to convict': NIA court acquits all 7 accused in Malegaon blast case
MUMBAI: A special National Investigation Agency (NIA) court on Thursday acquitted all seven accused, including former BJP MP Pragya Singh Thakur and Lt Col Prasad Purohit, in the 2008 Malegaon bomb blast case. Six people were killed and over 100 were injured when an explosive device strapped on a motorcycle went off near a mosque in Malegaon, a town in north Maharashtra, on September 29, 2008, during the holy month of Ramadan. While pronouncing the verdict, Special Judge AK Lahoti of the NIA court observed that the prosecution has failed to bring any "cogent evidence" and therefore the accused deserved the benefit of doubt. "Upon comprehensive evaluation, the prosecution has failed to bring any cogent evidence and the evidence is riddled with inconsistencies," the court noted. "There can be strong suspicion but mere suspicion is not enough to punish them. The high degree of suspicion is established but not enough to convict them. Hence the court said that it has given them the benefit of doubt," the court said. "Terrorism has no religion but conviction cannot be based on moral grounds," the court remarked. The court passed the order after a lengthy trial in the case that spanned nearly 17 years. Lt Col Purohit, Pragya Thakur, Major (retired) Ramesh Upadhyay, Ajay Rahirkar, Sudhakar Dwivedi, Sudhakar Chaturvedi and Sameer Kulkarni had been under trial in the case under the provisions the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, or UAPA, Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act (MCOCA) and the Indian Penal Code (IPC). Regarding the charges against Pragya Thakur, the court noted that the prosecution had failed to establish that the exploded bike belonged to her and observed that she had become a 'Sadhvi' and "left all material things" two years before the blast. Serial number of the two-wheeler's chassis was not completely recovered by the forensic experts and therefore, the prosecution failed to prove that the bike in fact belonged to her, the court remarked.
The Print
2 hours ago
- The Print
2008 Malegaon blast case: Pragya Thakur, 6 others acquitted as court gives them ‘benefit of doubt'
Terrorism has no religion but conviction cannot be based on moral grounds, special judge said, while acquiting all the seven accused in the case. Apart from Thakur and Purohit, the other accused were Major Ramesh Upadhyay (retd.), Ajay Rahirkar, Sudhakar Dwivedi, Sudhakar Chaturvedi, and Sameer Kulkarni. Mumbai: Nearly 17 years after a blast ripped through a chowk in the otherwise quiet town in Maharashtra's Nashik, Sadhvi Pragya Singh Thakur, Lt Colonel Prasad Purohit and five other accused in the Malegaon blast case were acquitted by a special NIA court on Thursday. 'Prosecution proved that a blast occurred in Malegaon, but failed to prove that bomb was placed in that motorcycle,' the judge said. Six people were killed and more than 100 injured when an explosive went off on the night of 29 September, 2008 during the holy month of Ramzan and the eve of Navratri, in Malegaon. From the arrest of saffron-clad Pragya Singh Thakur to turf wars between government agencies, the case saw more than its fair share of twists and turns. With the special NIA court finally pronuncing its verdict, ThePrint looks at the case and how it unfolded over the decades. In the aftermath of the blast, the initial probe was carried out by the Maharashtra Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS) and its chief, the late Hemant Karkare. He traced the motorcycle used in the blast to Surat, and later to Pragya Singh Thakur, a former Madhya Pradesh Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) activist. She was arrested in October 2008. It was under Karkare that raids in Pune, Nashik, Indore and Bhopal led investigators to an alleged Hindu extremist based in Indore. The trail then took them to an Army officer, Lieutenant Colonel Purohit, and Major Upadhyay (retired), who were arrested on 4-5 November 2008. However, Karkare was killed in the 26/11 Mumbai terror attack. During the investigation, ATS found alleged links between the accused and a Hindu fundamentalist group, Abhinav Bharat, as well as a self-proclaimed seer, Sudhakar Dwivedi alias Dayanand Pandey. ATS investigators alleged that the accused conducted a demonstration of explosives in a jungle near Pune, although defence lawyers argued that no witness testimony from local villagers was presented to support this claim. Subsequently, on 20 January, 2009, a chargesheet of 4,528 pages was filed under sections of the erstwhile Indian Penal Code (IPC), the Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act (MCOCA), the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA), and the Explosive Substances Act. In July 2009, the MCOCA charges were dropped only to be reinstated by the Bombay High Court a year later. In December 2010, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) arrested a self-proclaimed monk, Naba Kumar Sarkar, also known as Aseemanand, in connection with the case. Aseemanand, according to news reports at the time, allegedly confessed before a magistrate that the Malegaon blasts of 2006 and 2008 were carried out by radical Hindu groups as 'revenge against jihadi terrorism'. He said the plan to target Muslims was hatched by a group led by one-time Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) pracharak Sunil Joshi. He also claimed the group was behind the Samjhauta Express, Ajmer Dargah and Mecca Masjid blasts of 2007. But, Aseemanand subsequently retracted his statement and has now been acquitted of all charges. A supplementary chargesheet was filed on 21 April, 2011, before the special MCOCA court in Mumbai, in which the ATS named 14 accused—Thakur, Purohit, Upadhyay, Dwivedi, Shivnarayan Kalsangra, Shyam Sahu, Sameer Kulkarni, Ajay alias Raja Rahirkar (treasurer of Abinav Bharat), Rakesh Dhawade, Jagdish Mhatre, Sudhakar Chaturvedi, Pravin Takalki, Ramchandra Kalsangra and Sandeep Dange. In April 2011, the Centre transferred the Malegaon (2006 and 2008), Mecca Masjid (2007) and Ajmer Dargah (2007) blast cases to the National Investigation Agency (NIA). The agency had been investigating the Samjhauta Express blast case since 2010. Also Read: Sadhvi Pragya's doctor debunks claim of cow urine curing her cancer, says she had surgeries NIA takes over The NIA alleged that the Malegaon blasts were carried out by a Hindu fundamentalist module led by Sunil Joshi and Pragya Singh Thakur. Joshi was murdered on 29 December, 2007, barely a few hundred metres from his rented accommodation in Madhya Pradesh's Dewas. Pragya Singh Thakur was earlier charged in the murder of Joshi along with others but later acquitted in 2017. The agency also alleged that Purohit knew Pragya Singh Thakur and allegedly played a key logistics role in the blasts. The role of Purohit, who was associated with Military Intelligence and Anti-Terrorism/Insurgency activities, in the entire operation is key. During the investigation, NIA said he supposedly bragged to a witness and had shown him explosive RDX, which he is alleged to have obtained from an Army operation in Kashmir. Purohit applied for bail in the high court in 2011, but his request was denied. While denying him bail, the high court document noted that Ajay Rahirkar, Pragya Singh Thakur, Sudhakar Dhar Dwivedi, also known as Shankaracharya, and one Rakesh Dhawade formed an organisation known as the Abhinav Bharat Trust in Pune in 2006 with headquarters at Ajay Rahirkar's address. It was registered on 9 February, 2007. They allegedly took an oath to strive to turn India into a 'Hindu Rashtra' called 'Aryawart'. But in 2012, the Supreme Court extended its order restraining the NIA from interrogating Purohit and Sudhakar Dhar Dwivedi till further directions. The NIA was conducting its investigation when the government at the Centre changed in 2014 and the Narendra Modi-led BJP government came to power for the first time. In 2015, Rohini Salian, special public prosecutor in the case, said she had been under pressure from the NIA to go 'soft' in the case over the past year since 'the new government came to power'. She said she got a call from an NIA officer asking her to come over to speak with her. However, the NIA denied these claims. After nearly five years of investigation, in 2016, NIA filed its chargesheet, but it absolved Pragya Singh Thakur and prosecuted Purohit, with the caveat that the evidence was weak. The NIA even dropped charges under MCOCA against all accused, and described Karkare's investigation as flawed. This was a part of the supplementary chargesheet filed by NIA, listing shortcomings in the ATS investigation, including talk of the use of 'torture' by the ATS to allegedly extract confessional statements from the accused. 'ATS Mumbai invoked MCOCA on the basis of the involvement of accused Rakesh Dhawade in the previous two blast cases i.e. Parbhani and Jalna, in which the concerned courts had taken cognisance. The way and circumstances in which the ATS invoked the provisions of MCOCA in this case becomes questionable,' the NIA chargesheet said. According to the ATS charge sheet filed in 2011, Thakur, who allegedly owned the motorcycle used in the blast, was suspected to be part of most meetings of the accused from 2006 onward, during which plans to target Muslim-majority areas were discussed. ATS claimed meetings about the 2008 Malegaon blast took place from January of that year at various locations including Faridabad, Bhopal, Kolkata, Jabalpur, Indore and Nashik. At one such meeting in Bhopal on April 11, 2008, Thakur was allegedly tasked with finding the men to execute the bombing. These men were Sunil Joshi, Ramchandra Kalsangra and Sandeep Dange, the chargesheet said. Initially, Thakur was charged in the case because the motorcycle used in the blast was in her name. However, in the NIA chargesheet, it was claimed that the bike was in Thakur's name, but was being used by another accused, Kalsangra, for two years before the blast. He paid for its repairs and maintenance, the NIA said. Following the chargesheet in which Thakur was given a clean chit, she was granted bail by the NIA special court in April 2017. Purohit was granted bail in August 2017. However, it did not accept Thakur's acquittal by NIA, and in December 2017, ordered that both Purohit and Thakur face trial under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act. While framing charges, the special judge acknowledged there was 'no direct evidence regarding discussion of causing bomb blast at Malegaon amongst the accused persons except in the Bhopal meeting'. But the court also noted that witnesses had retracted statements in which they said there was a discussion about carrying out a bomb blast at Malegaon in the Bhopal meeting. However, relying on a top court judgment in a case involving Nalini, who was convicted of being part of the plot to assassinate former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi, the judge said that 'conspiracy generally is hatched in private or in secrecy'. 'It is rarely possible to establish a conspiracy by direct evidence. Usually, both i.e. existence of the conspiracy and its objects have to be inferred from the circumstances and the conduct of the accused. Tone of the discussion shows that they want to create Hindu Rashtra excluding the Muslims and Christians. In the said meeting, view was expressed to create threat against Muslims and Christians by striking them,' the judge said. 'On this background there is involvement of LML Freedom motorcycle belonging to accused No. 1 Pragya Singh Thakur in the bomb blast at Malegaon,' the judge said. 'There are also certain statements made by the accused No. 9 amounting to extra-judicial confession and by accused No. 1 indicating her knowledge about involvement of her motorcycle in the bomb blast.' During the course of the investigation and hearing, more than 300 prosecution witnesses were heard, of whom over 35 turned hostile. For instance, one of the witnesses who had previously, in his statement to the Maharashtra ATS, allegedly said that one absconding accused had met Pragya Singh Thakur on multiple occasions and that he had seen the absconding accused riding a motorcycle, which allegedly belonged to Thakur. But in March 2023, he retracted his statement. Another witness had earlier claimed to have known Thakur but later denied and retracted his statement given to the ATS. The case has been going on since 2018 at a special sessions court where charges were framed against seven people under various sections of the IPC and UAPA. Meanwhile, in 2019, BJP fielded Pragya Singh Thakur from the Bhopal Lok Sabha seat against Digvijaya Singh, and she won. The party decided against fielding her from the seat in 2024. During the trial, since Thakur had been out on bail, she was the one most inconsistent in attending hearings. She was even issued warnings by the court on multiple occasions. The phase involving prosecution witnesses was completed in September 2023. The final hearing of the arguments started in July 2024, with the court hearing arguments from the prosecution and defence on an almost daily basis until 19 April, 2025. (Edited by Sugita Katyal) Also Read: Rubbing salt on our wounds: Malegaon residents on Sadhvi Pragya fighting election
