A special NIA court on Tuesday rejected the bail plea of Sadhvi Pragya, the main accused in 2008 Malegaon blast, stating that prima facie materials are available against the accused, which questioned the National Investigation Agency (NIA) for recently dropping charges against her.
Last month, the National Investigation Agency (NIA) had also dropped charges against her under the Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act (MCOCA), citing insufficient evidence. Nisar Ahmed Sayyed Bilal, who was among those injured in the blast, had filed an intervention application and opposed her plea.
Informing the media over the development, Wahab Khan, lawyer to a victim’s relative said, “Court has said that prima facie and MCOCA cannot be dropped against Sadhvi Pragya Thakur. It has taken an independent view and the NIA’s NOC (No objection certificate) has been discarded.”
However, court also pointed out that, “At this prima facie stage, she can’t avoid her connection with the motorcycle used in the blast being registered in her name and she being the owner of the same.”
At the prima facie stage, without going to the question which version of witness’s statement is correct, a safe conclusion can be drawn on the basis of statement that during a meeting in Bhopal, the applicant was present and there was a discussion about jihadi activities in Aurangabad and Malegaon and ways to prevent it.
Special Judge NA Tikole said, “It was evident from their discussion that the above participants wanted to establish the ‘Hindu Rashtra’ and during the meeting, they also discussed to establish a ‘government in exile.’ They were not ready to accept present Constitution and wanted one of their own.”
The court said that the NIA, which took over the case in 2011, launched a “fresh investigation” instead of taking forward the Maharashtra Anti-Terror Squad’s work on the case.
“There are reasonable grounds to believe in accusations against Pragya, is prima facie true.
“It is difficult to accept the prayer (bail application) merely on the ground that the NIA has given a clean-chit to Sadhvi Pragya,” pointed out Justice Tikole.
The NIA said in its charge-sheet that “during investigation, sufficient evidences have not been found” against Sadhvi Pragya. It also said the motorcycle registered in her name was used by an accused which is missing.
On May 13, NIA had submitted a supplementary charge-sheet giving clean chit to six accused including Sadhvi and also recommended to drop all the charges against them. The agency said that they don’t have sufficient evidence to prosecute Sadhvi, after which Sadhvi had applied for the bail.
Sadhvi’s advocate had on May 30, filed a bail application on the ground that the NIA has not pressed any charges against her owing to lack of evidence and that her health is deteriorating. The defense pleaded that she had no knowledge of how her motorbike was used in the blast and she had never given her consent for the same. He also said that the bike had been sold long before the incident.
“After this bail plea being rejected, we will approach the high court against the Special NIA court order,” a family member of Sadhvi Pradhya said.
Pragya is yet to get bail in Sunil Joshi’s murder case.
On September 29, 2008, seven people were killed in a massive blast at Malegaon, a predominantly Muslim town in Nashik district of north Maharashtra.
Pragya was the first accused to be arrested in the Malegaon blast case on October 23, 2008 by the ATS. She used to live in Jabalpur at that time.
