Former Bajrang Dal leader Babu Bajrangi, convicted and sentenced to life in prison in the 2002 Naroda Patiya riot case, today withdrew his temporary bail plea from the High Court to grant him relief on medical grounds.
Bajrangi had earlier sought temporary bail for 45 days from the Gujarat High Court on medical grounds. He pleaded that he needed to undergo treatment for his ailments caused due to food poisoning and infection in his blood.
While hearing his plea on December 11, the High Court bench of justices S R Brahmbhatt and K J Thaker asked the Special Investigation Team (SIT) as well as superintendent of civil hospital to submit results of all the medical tests conducted on Bajrangi.
The hospital authorities today submitted the reports, in which it was stated that Bajrangi’s blood tests did not show any symptoms of infection.
After going through the opinion of the medical experts, the judges indicated that they were not inclined to grant him relief, following which Bajrangi’s lawyers withdrew the bail plea.
Bajrangi is one of the 31 convicts in 2002 Naroda Patiya riot case, where 97 people of the minority community were killed. He was awarded ‘imprisonment till death’ by a special trial court in August 2012.
Former state minister Maya Kodnani was also convicted in the same case.
Bajrangi had challenged his conviction before the High Court which is pending at present.
He was earlier granted temporary bail by the Gujarat High Court six times on various grounds.
Naroda Patiya is one of the nine cases probed by the Supreme Court-appointed SIT.
The violence in Naroda Patiya area broke out here a day after the S-6 coach of Sabarmati express was burnt near Godhra Railway Station on February 27, 2002, which claimed lives of 58 ‘Karsevaks’.
