2008 Malegaon blasts case: Special court in Mumbai rejects NIA's plea for 'in-camera' proceedings

A special court in Mumbai rejected the National Investigating Agency’s (NIA) plea to allow ‘in-camera’ proceedings in the 2008 Malegaon blast case and restrain the media from reporting the trial. One of the reasons listed by courts to reject NIA’s plea was to maintain transparency in the trial. A group of 11 journalists, The Indian Express reported, had filed an intervention application opposing the NIA’s plea to restrain the media from reporting the proceedings. [caption id=“attachment_3425624” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] Six persons were killed and nearly 100 injured when a blast rocked Malegaon in Maharashtra in September 2008. Reuters[/caption] In its petition, the special agency cited the “sensitive nature of the case,” and provisions of the UAPA (Unlawful Activities Prevention Act) and the NIA Act, and said that the special court has powers to pass an order to conduct the proceedings in-camera. An ‘in-camera’ trial allows the accused, counsel and judge to be present during the court proceedings and bars the media from covering it. Last month, a group of journalists had moved the special NIA court seeking intervention in the NIA’s application. Kin of the deceased in the blast had, however, moved the court in support of the application filed by the agency. The agency rejected the journalists’ application saying that the media had no locus in the case, considering the ‘sensitive nature’ of the case. Six people were killed and over 100 injured when an explosive device strapped to a motorcycle went off near a mosque in Malegaon, a town in north Maharashtra, on 29 September, 2008. Besides BJP lawmaker Pragya Singh Thakur, Lieutenant Colonel Prasad Purohit, retired Major Ramesh Upadhyay, Sudhakar Dwivedi, Ajay Rahirkar, Sudhakar Chaturvedi and Samir Kulkarni are also accused in the case. With inputs from ANI