An Indian court convicted 24 people over a massacre during religious riots of Gujarat in 2002 when incumbent Prime Minister of India Narendra Modi was chief minister of the Gujarat state. Court believed that 24 Hindus convicted were involved in the riots as they found guilty of abetting in the massacre of 69 Muslims, who were hacked and burnt to death as they took refuge in a residential complex in the city of Ahmedabad.
Incumbent Prime Minister of India Modi was severely criticized not only in India but all over the world for allegedly encouraging anti-Muslim massacre in the state he was Chief Minister of. Muslims in great numbers were burnt alive, slaughtered including children, women and old people. According to estimates around one thousand Muslims were killed in the gory incidents.
At the time Court when public prosecutors requested the court to give maximum punishment to the accused due to the gravity of the crime, family members of the victim present there expressed jubilations. Indeed they deserve the celebration; they must have been very disappointed to keep hopes of justice of the incidents that took place 14 years before. We must laud the courage of the judge P B Desaifor not bowing to the pressure of the extremists and for convicting extremists for their inhuman and brutal activities against the humanity. It is time to give justice to the innocent victims of Samjhota Express, a gory incident in which about 50 people were burnt alive mercilessly. Though wounds of those who survived from barbaric incidents live forever but court judgment would heal some wounds.
Judge must be lauded for putting aside all the pressure from Hindu lobbies and for standing beside the justice.
