The Hindu : Bomb blasts in Godhra, Ahmedabad

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Oct 16, 2002

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Bomb blasts in Godhra, Ahmedabad

By Manas Dasgupta

AHMEDABAD Oct.15. At least six persons were injured in bomb blasts in Godhra and Ahmedabad this evening. Police said four persons were severely injured when a powerful bomb went off in a State road transport bus at the Godhra terminus this evening. The bomb exploded soon after the bus, coming from a nearby village, was parked at the terminus. Four persons standing nearby were hit by splinters. The condition of three of the injured is stated to be critical.

Police said the blast could have caused more casualties if the bomb had gone off 30 minutes later, when thousands of people were expected to assemble in the adjacent ground for the "Ravan-dahan'' celebrations on Dussehra.

In Ahmedabad, two persons were injured in a blast while scraps were being loaded in a truck at a scrap market in the Dani Limda locality. The bomb apparently came with the scrap materials, but police could not say if it was planted intentionally. Both the injured have been declared out of danger.

Incidentally, the bomb blasts took place a day after a section of the minorities observed a "bandh'' in various parts of Gujarat, protesting against the remarks by an American preacher against Islam.

Meanwhile, the Ahmedabad City Sessions Court has filed chargesheets against 23 accused in the Gulmarg Society incident of Chamanpura locality on February 28, in which more than 30 persons, including the former Congress member of the Lok Sabha, Ehsan Jafri, were burnt alive.

The charges against the accused include unlawful assembly, looting, rape, arson and murder. Framing the chargesheets, the Additional Sessions Judge, B. N. Jani, observed that the accused had gathered outside the Society with the intention of murdering Muslims, in the aftermath of the Godhra train carnage. The accused were also charged with raising provocative slogans and instigating a mob of about 20,000 people to attack the residential colony and set people afire. A specific charge of rape was framed against a person, Prabhudas Mochi. The court held that at least two women were raped in Gulmarg Society.

It was the first chargesheet filed in the Gulmarg Society case. The chargesheets in the other heinous crime in Naroda-Patiya locality on the same day was filed earlier. More than 120 people were burnt alive in the two incidents in Ahmedabad on the "Gujarat bandh'' day called by the Vishwa Hindu Parishad to protest against the Godhra carnage.

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