Malegaon Blast 2008: Special NIA court frames charges against Lt Col Purohit In Malegaon Blast Case

A day after Bombay High Court refused to stay framing of charges by the trial court against Lt Col Prasad Shrikant Purohit and other accused persons in the 2008 Malegaon bomb blast case, the special NIA (National Investigation Agency) court on Tuesday, has framed charges against Purohit and other accused. After the charges are framed by the Special NIA court, the criminal case will commence against all the accused.

As per the orders of NIA court judge, charges have been framed against the accused under Section 302 of the Indian Penal Code, stating that the accused are guilty of murder, criminal and abetment. While the accused said that they are guilty, the Special NIA court declared that all the accused were found guilty of the crime. The court also stated that the act of the seven accused in the case comes under terror activities.

Furthermore, UAPA has also been applied against all seven accused.

On October 27, a special NIA court deferred the proceedings against Purohit and other accused in the case to October 30, while dictating its order and warned all the accused against delaying the proceedings and investigation in the case. The court also said this was the last chance for the accused to follow the court's order and remain present in court. While the special NIA court judge dictated the order, accused Lt Col Shrikant Prasad Purohit and Sameer Kulkarni were present before the court whereas the remaining five accused were not present, as a result of which the court issued a warning to the accused through their lawyers.

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Six persons were killed and over a 100 injured when an explosive device strapped on a motorcycle went off near a mosque in Malegaon, a power loom town located about 200 km from here in North Maharashtra, on September 29, 2008. Besides Purohit and Sameer Kulkarni, the other accused case are Pragya Singh Thakur, Major (retd) Ramesh Upadhyay, Ajay Rahirkar, Sudhakar Dwivedi and Sudhakar Chaturvedi. All of them will face trial under the UAPA since earlier this month, the special NIA court had rejected their pleas on the applicability of the anti-terror law against them.

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