Malegaon unhappy with probe

Three Years After Blast, Residents Say 9 Accused Were Framed

Mateen Hafeez I TNN

Mumbai: Textile town Malegaon has witnessed unrest, violence and protests over the last three years, when four bombs planted on cycles, went off killing 31 and injuring 297. Residents of this Muslim dominated town insist that the nine youths arrested have been framed.

The city, with a seven-lakh plus population, has been in the news since September 8, 2006, when the RDX-ammonium nitrate bombs exploded inside a cemetery on the occasion of Shab-e-Baraat.

The ATS has arrested nine suspected SIMI members. Following anti-ATS protests in Malegaon, the probe was handed over to the CBI on December 21, 2006, the day when a 10,500-page charge sheet was filed in the MCOCA court.

Over a dozen delegations from Malegaon have been meeting various government authorities saying the investigations were not fair. Residents also staged morchas demanding ATS chief K P Raghuvanshi’s ouster, saying he had failed to give “concrete evidence’’ of the youths’ involvement. “The ATS framed them,’’ said Maulana Abdul Kareem Milli, the local chief of Majlis-e-Shura.

A group of eminent citizens, lawyers, social workers, ulemas, relatives of the victims and the suspects, have formed a committee to investigate the case on their own. Advocate S S Shaikh said that the fact-finding report was submitted to the CBI on September 17, 2007. “We have given several clues that could help police in nabbing the real culprits. We are unable to understand whether our report is an obstacle for CBI or if it did not like our truth?’’ Shaikh asked.

One of the suspects, Noorul-Huda, a SIMI member, was initially picked up in 2006 after the ATS seized a huge cache of arms and ammunition in Aurangabad. He was subsequently made a witness in this case. The ATS, at the same time, booked him as a bomb planter in the Malegaon blast. Shaikh said that when Huda was under surveillance after the arms haul, it was not possible for him to commit such an act.

A member asked how another accused, Shabbir Masiuallah, could have allowed his godown to be used for making the bombs when he was in the crime branch custody since August 3, 2006.

Over 2,500 people in Yavatmal have filed an affidavit in court, stating that another accused Zahid Ahmed was in Yavatmal on the day of Malegaon blasts. There was also allegations that the cops won over the lone approver in the case.

Raghuvanshi refused to comment. CBI also refused to comment, saying their “investigation is still on’’.

DON’T QUASH MCOCA CHARGES: ATS
The ATS appeal against the MCOCA court’s order dropping the stringent law, MCOCA, from the 2008 Malegaon blast suspects, will be heard on Tuesday. The ATS in its appeal stated, “The judge has totally exceeded his powers while quashing the said order (to invoke MCOCA) of the competent authorities. The judge ought to have considered that the designated judge under the MCOCA Act is not empowered by the provisions of the said Act to quash such orders of the competent authority.’’

The Times of India, September 8, 2009