7 accused in 2008 Malegaon blast booked with terror conspiracy, murder

Mumbai: A special National Investigation Agency (NIA) court in Mumbai on Tuesday framed charges against Lt Col Prasad Shrikant Purohit, Sadhvi Pragya Singh Thakur and five others under the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA) and sections of the IPC in the September 2008 Malegaon bomb blast case.

Judge Vinod Padalkar, presiding over the special National Investigation Agency (NIA) court, framed charges against the accused people.

The Bombay High Court on Monday refused to stay framing of charges by the trial court against Lt Col Prasad Shrikant Purohit and other accused people in the 2008 Malegaon bomb blast case.

It directed the National Investigation Agency (NIA) counsel Sandesh Patil to file a reply to Lt Col Purohit's plea by November 21, the next date of hearing.

The bench refused Lt Col Purohit's request for staying the proceedings in the trial court, noting that in the past, both the Supreme Court and the Bombay HC had passed orders directing the trial court to expedite the hearing in the case.

Under the UAPA, the accused have been charged with being part of a terrorist act, and under IPC they have been charged with criminal conspiracy and murder. Framing of charges is a process after which the trial in a criminal case starts.

Apart from Purohit and Sadhvi, the other accused are Major (Retd) Ramesh Upadhyay, Ajay Rahirkar, Sudhakar Dwivedi, Sudhakar Chaturvedi and Sameer Kulkarni.

All the accused were present in the court when the judge read out the charges against them.

Six people were killed and over 100 injured when an explosive device strapped on a motorcycle went off near a mosque in Malegaon, a town about 200 km from here in North Maharashtra, on September 29, 2008.