Convictions in Gujarat Riot Case Could Have Political Consequences

By GARDINER HARRIS and HARI KUMAR

NEW DELHI, India â€" A former state education minister and 31 others were convicted Wednesday for their roles in the deaths of 94 people during one of the most savage attacks of the 2002 Gujarat riots.

The convictions could have political consequences. Narendra Modi, Gujarat's chief minister and a possible candidate for prime minister for the Bharatiya Janata Party in 2014, has long denied any role in the riots despite witnesses who say he discouraged police from intervening. The conviction of the former state education minister, Mayaben Kodnani, who is also a state legislator, is the first among Mr. Modi's confidants. Cellphone records demonstrated that she was at the scene of the riot, contradicting her own testimony.

“This is the first Gujarat riot case which has links to the political conspiracy,” said Teesta Setalvad, a victim's advocate who has played crucial roles in many of the Gujarat cases. “I salute the decade-long fight by victims and witnesses.”

Sentencing may occur as soon as tomorrow.

Jaynarayan Vyas, a cabinet minister for the Gujarat government, sought to distance the administration from Ms. Kodnani, saying she only became the state education minister after the riots. “Until we read the full judgment, we will not give our opinion,” he said. Prakash Javadekar, a spokesman for the Bharatiya Janata Party, said: “This is the judicial process. Whosoever is the culprit will be punished by the court. It is the first stage of judgment. This is a legal process.”

A total of 327 witnesses testified in the case, and prosecutors presented 2,005 documents. Sixty-seven people were charged, of whom 32 were convicted and 29 acquitted. Six defendants died during the proceedings.
“More than 90 defenseless persons, mostly women and children of a minority community, were killed,” said Akhil D esai, the prosecutor on the case. “I pleaded with the court to give them the maximum punishment of a death sentence.”

On the morning of Feb. 28, rioters broke through the stone walls encircling the Muslim neighborhood of Naroda Patiya and attacked families eating breakfast. They threw children and old women into burning pyres and knifed and bludgeoned others. Some who tried to escape said that the police refused to help.

The day before the attack, a train filled with Hindu pilgrims was attacked by a Muslim mob in the nearby city of Godhra. A fire started and at least 58 Hindu pilgrims burned to death. Mr. Modi and his party endorsed a strike, and the charred bodies of the pilgrims were brought to Ahmedabad and laid out in public, where thousands viewed them â€" an act almost guaranteed to incite violence. Sure enough, massacres began almost immediately.

Little was done to prosecute rioters until 2004, when the Supreme Court ordered that a special police team be created and some trials be transferred out of Gujarat. Another crucial turning point came when Dr. Mukul Sinha, a lawyer representing victims, was given records by a top police official of every cellphone call made during the worst of the rioting.

The court decision on Wednesday, Mr. Sinha said in an interview, “gives us a lot of satisfaction because Naroda Patiya was the biggest massacre during the riots.”

Many political analysts believe that blanket coverage of the riots by India's newly vibrant TV news channels and the unprecedented prosecutions of hundreds may have helped to snap the country's long history of mass rioting.
Noor Bano, a former Naroda Patiya resident whose two teenage sons were seriously injured during the attacks, vowed in an interview to continue fighting for justice. “They killed our people, so they should also be given death sentences,” she said.