Gujarat Court Acquits All 26 Gangrape, Murder Accused In 2002 Riots Case For Want Of Evidence

The FIR was registered after a mob of 2,000 people from two different communities clashed with sharp weapons and inflammable objects in Kalol district of Gandhinagar district during 2002 riots.

26 persons accused of gangrape and murder during 2002 Gujarat riots were acquitted by court. (Representational Image)

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New Delhi: A court in Gujarat’s Panchmahal district has acquitted all 26 persons accused of gangrape and murder of over a dozen members of a minority community in separate incidents in Kalol during the 2002 communal riots for want of evidence in the 20-year-old case. As per a report by PTI, a court of additional sessions judge of Halol in Panchmahal district, Leelabhai Chudasama, on Friday acquitted 26 persons for the offence of murder, gangrape and rioting for want of evidence.

Of the total 39 accused in the case, 23 died during the pendency of the case and the trial against them was abated. 

As per the report, an FIR was registered against the accused at Kalol Police Station on March 2, 2002 after the mob went rampage in the communal riots. 

The FIR was registered after a mob of 2,000 people from two different communities clashed with sharp weapons and inflammable objects in Kalol district of Gandhinagar district. 

They damaged shops and set them on fire. A man who was injured in police firing and being rushed to the hospital was burnt alive along with a tempo. The mob attacked and killed another man coming out of a mosque and burnt his body inside the mosque.

The incident took place on March 1, 2002 during a bandh call given after the Sabarmati train was torched in Godhara on February 27. 

190 witnesses and 334 documentary evidence were examined by the prosecution in support of its argument but the court said there were contradictions in the witnesses' accounts, and they did not support the prosecution's argument.

In another incident, 38 persons fleeing Delol village and coming towards Kalol were attacked and 11 of them were burnt alive. A woman was gang raped when she and others were trying to escape, as per the FIR.