New Delhi: A special Gujarat court on Tuesday delivered its verdict in the Ahmedabad serial bomb blast case after 13 years of trial. The court held 49 guilty of the crime, while 28 other accused were acquitted.
The quantum of punishment will be pronounced by justice AR Patel on Wednesday. As many as 77 were facing trial in the case.
The trial in the case had ended in September last year but adjournments prolonged the announcement of the Judgement.
On July 26, 2008 a series of blasts had rocked Ahmedabad city in which 56 people were killed and over 200 hundred injured. Islamic militant group Harkat-ul-Jihand-al-Islami had claimed responsibility of the attack. As many as 21 bomb blasts were carried out by the outfit across the city in a span of 70 minutes. The trauma centre of the Ahmedabad civil hospital was also targeted in the blasts.
The attack was allegedly carried out by the terrorists as a revenge for the riots that happened in Godhra, Gujarat in 2002. Several people of the minority community were killed in the incident.
After the blast, Gujarat police arrested 85 people over a period of time but trial commenced against 78 persons as one of the accused later turned an approver for the police.
FIRs in the case were filed at two places, one in Ahmedabad where the serial blasts had taken place and the second in Surat where the police recovered bombs from different locations. During the 13-year-long trial the prosecution examined over 1,100 witnesses before justice AR Patel.