Ode massacre: 18 sentenced to life, five get 7 years in jail

A special court in Gujarat sentenced 18 persons to life imprisonment for their involvement in the massacre in Ode village of Gujarat during the communal riots of 2002 The court also sentenced five other persons convicted in the case to seven years of rigorous imprisonment. [caption id=“attachment_273399” align=“alignleft” width=“380” caption=“Screen grab from CNN IBN of Ode village.”]  [/caption] The prosecution had sought capital punishment for all the convicted accused but the court accepted the defence’s plea that the case did not come under the “rarest of rare” categories. The 18 persons, convicted under section 302 of the Indian Penal code for murder, were sentenced to life imprisonment. The five others were convicted for attempt to murder and destruction of property using an explosive substance. The legal counsel for the accused said that they would be be appealing against the judgement and will go to a higher court. The court also imposed a fine of Rs 5,800 each on the accused sentenced to life imprisonment and Rs 3,800 each on the five convicts awarded jail term for seven years. The pronouncement of the verdict caused uproar among the family members and relatives of the convicts who were standing inside the court campus and many of them broke down. “There is no evidence against the accused. This is injustice, this is not the temple of justice but temple of injustice,” the relatives alleged. More than 100 people, including women and children, who were gathered at the campus, resorted to sloganeering. However, police removed them out of the campus. The special court on 9 April had convicted 23 people in connection with the massacre of 24 people who took shelter in a house and were killed when a mob set it on fire during the post-Godhra riots in 2002 in Gujarat. While 47 people were charged with the massacre in Ode village in Gujarat’s Anand district, two of them are absconding and one died during the course of the trial. The verdict, delivered ten years after the riots, is a culmination of a series of ups and downs. More than 150 witnesses were examined by the court, while over 170 documentary evidences were also placed before the court. The trial began at the end of 2009 and was on the verge of completion when the then judge hearing the case resigned in May 2011 citing personal reasons. After allegations that Gujarat police had not been able to investigate the case impartially, it was handed over to the Supreme Court-appointed SIT, which filed a charge sheet against 47 persons. The SIT urged the court to place the massacre in the rarest of the rare category. Another incident during the post Godhra riots that killed four people in the same village is also being heard by the court, and the verdict in that case is to be delivered later. This is the second major post-Godhra riot case where more than 18 people have been sentenced to life imprisonment. Earlier, in the Sardarpura riot case of Mehsana district 31 persons were awarded life term and 42 others were acquitted. In the Godhra train burning case, court had awarded death sentence to 11 people and 20 were given life imprisonment. The Ode riot case is one of the nine cases that was probed by the Supreme Court-appointed Special Investigation Team led by former CBI director R K Raghavan. with inputs from PTI