Maya Kodnani, one of those accused of playing a role in the the Naroda Gam massacre during the 2002 Gujarat riots, was on Wednesday granted permission to examine 14 people as her defence witnesses to prove her innocence. Her list includes Bharatiya Janata Party chief Amit Shah.
Naroda Gam is a suburb of Ahmedabad, around a kilometre from Narodiya Patiya which witnessed maximum violence during the riots. More than 1,000 people, mostly Muslims, were killed in the riots. The violence started after Hindu pilgrims were killed when a train was set on fire in Godhra.
Kodnani’s application was approved after the Special Investigation Team did not raise any objections to it, reported The Indian Express. “It is ordered that witness summons be issued on the persons particularised in the application, at the appropriate and relevant stage of the trial,” special judge Pranav B Desai said. “…In the absence of any objections and while recognising the right of the accused to examine defence witnesses, I am of the opinion that the number of witnesses sought to be examined is neither unreasonable nor unjustified.”
Kodnani had filed her plea seeking the court’s direction to issue summons to her witnesses. The former Gujarat minister has held that on the day of the incident, February 28, 2002, she was first in the state Assembly, then at Sola civil hospital, her maternity home in Asarva, the civil hospital in Asarva and her home.
She has said that her version of the story can be corroborated by her witnesses, which includes Shah, who she said she had met in the Assembly and the Sola civil hospital. She was sentenced to 28 years in prison in connection with the Naroda Patiya massacre case. She was arrested in 2009, but got bail in July 2014.
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