A special court in Gujarat on Thursday acquitted all the 67 accused, including former Bharatiya Janata Party minister Maya Kodnani, in the 2002 Naroda Gam riots case in which 11 people were killed.
Gujarat BJP leaders on Friday said if the physician-turned-politician, once a member of the powerful Narendra Modi ministry in the state and rising star in politics, wants to return to active politics, the saffron party will definitely assign work to her.
Gujarat minister Maya Kodnani, who remained elusive for past five days and was declared an absconder, surfaced on Friday, a day after a Ahmedabad court granted her anticipatory bail in connection with post-Godhra riots cases.
Citing the testimonies of eye witnesses, Vyas said that people of that area saw Kodnani at Naroda Gam during the morning.
The seven others who Kodnani wanted to be summoned as witnesses are former BJP MLA Amrish Patel, Jagdish Patel, Lakhabhai Rathod, Dhaval Shah, Dhiraj Rathod, M D Lakhiya and Kantibhai Solanki.
Political observers feel that Kodnani's arrest will help the Bharatiya Janata Party project a more 'secular and fair' image.
She said she has not yet thought about joining active politics, but will continue to remain a Bharatiya Janata Party worker.
The high court upheld conviction of 13 people including Bajrangi, and convicted another three for the first time, while acquitting 18 of the 32 people convicted by the trial court in 2012.
The Supreme Court on Monday refused to extend the interim bail granted to former Gujarat minister Maya Kodnani, who has been convicted in the 2002 Naroda Patiya riots case.
The Gujarat high court on Thursday granted bail to former minister Maya Kodnani, who was convicted and sentenced to 28 years' imprisonment in the 2002 Naroda Paitya riots case in which 97 people were killed.
The Supreme Court on Monday extended till February 24 the interim bail to former Gujarat minister Maya Kodnani, convicted in the 2002 Naroda Patiya riots case, but made it clear that it won't be further extended if she fails to file an affidavit stating the kind of burn injury she suffered.
The Supreme Court on Wednesday said it will consider on Thursday the plea to extend the temporary bail granted to former Gujarat minister Maya Kodnani, convicted in the 2002 Naroda Patiya riot case, on medical grounds as she was in a "pitiable" condition after suffering burn injury.
Under attack from right wing forces, Gujarat government on Tuesday kept on hold its decision to seek death penalty for former minister Maya Kodnani, Babu Bajrangi and eight others in the 2002 Naroda Patiya riots case.
A single judge bench of the Gujarat high court on Tuesday recused itself from hearing a plea by former state minister Maya Kodnani, convicted in the 2002 Naroda Patia riot case, seeking regular bail on the ground of her ill-health.
The Gujarat High Court on Monday admitted the appeal of former state minister Maya Kodnani, who challenged her conviction in the case of Naroda Patiya massacre during the 2002 post-Godhra riots.
Dismissing demand for Chief Minister Narendra Modi's resignation following the verdict in Naroda Patiya case of 2002 riots, Gujarat government on Wednesday distanced itself from convicted Bharatiya Janata party Member of Legislative Assembly Dr Maya Kodnani saying she was not a minister when the incident occurred.
Vishwa Hindu Parishad's Gujarat unit had opposed the move of the state government to seek death penalty for former minister Maya Kodnani and others in the 2002 post-Godhra riots case, Parishad leader Pravin Togadia said on Wednesday.
The Gujarat High Court on Tuesday issued notice to state minister Maya Kodnani on an application filed by the Supreme Court appointed Special Investigation Team for cancellation of her anticipatory bail in the 2002 Naroda Patia riot case.
Former Gujarat minister and life-term convict in Naroda Patiya riot case Maya Kodnani has applied for bail before the Gujarat high court on medical grounds.
The Gujarat high court on Tuesday granted three-month temporary bail to Maya Kodnani, a convict in the 2002 Naroda Patiya riots case, on medical grounds.
He told the court that he had met Kodnani at Sola Civil Hospital that morning.
A special court on Friday sentenced Maya Kodnani, BJP MLA and former minister in the Narendra Modi government, to 28 years imprisonment and handed life term to Bajrang Dal leader Babu Bajrangi in the 2002 post-Godhra Naroda Patiya riots case.
A local court in Ahmedabad on Saturday sent former Gujarat minister Maya Kodnani accused in 2002 riot cases to 24-hour police custody and remanded co-accused former Vishwa Hindu Parishad leader Jaydeep Patel to judicial custody.
The hearing on the bail application of former Gujarat minister Maya Kodnani, an accused in the 2002 riots, was on Friday adjourned till April 27 by a court in Ahmedabad.Kodnani had applied for regular bail after her police remand ended last week. She is an accused in the Naroda Gam and Naroda Patiya cases, where 106 people of the minority community were killed by a mob on February 28, 2002.
The Gujarat government has refused permission to the Supreme Court-appointed Special Investigation Team to file an appeal in a higher court seeking death penalty for former minister Maya Kodnani in the Naroda Patiya riot case.
Eleven persons from Muslim community killed in violence in Naroda Gam area of Ahmedabad during the bandh call given by right-wing organisations a day after the Godhra train burning incident.
The Supreme Court-constituted Special Investigation Team, probing certain Gujarat riot cases afresh, on Friday filed a chargesheet in Naroda Gam case in which Bharatiya Janata Party leader and former state minister Maya Kodnani is one of the prime accused.
The Supreme Court-appointed Special Investigation Team (SIT) today recorded the statement of former Gujarat Minister Maya Kodnani, an accused in a 2002 post-Godhra riot case. The statement was recorded on a complaint filed by Zakia, whose husband Ehsan Jaffery, a former Congress MP was killed along with 69 others in a riot at Gulburg Society in Ahmedabad, SIT officials said.
The judgement in the Naroda Patiya case, in which 97 people of a minority community were killed during post-Godhra riots in 2002, was pronounced on Wednesday by a special trial court.
The Gujarat government has decided to seek death penalty for Maya Kodnani, a former minister in the Narendra Modi government, Bajrang Dal leader Babu Bajrangi and eight others in connection with the 2002 Naroda Patiya riot case.
With the Gujarat high court cancelling the anticipatory bail of state minister Maya Kodnani in the 2002 Naroda Patiya riot case, the Bharatiya Janata Party on Friday said it respected the court verdict and the law should take its course in the matter.
The Supreme Court-appointed Special Investigation Team (SIT) will challenge before the Gujarat high court the recent acquittal of all 67 accused in the 2002 Naroda Gam riot case by a special court, sources said.
Apart from the Naroda Gam case, seven other 2002 post-Godhra riots cases were investigated by the Supreme Court-appointed Special Investigation Team.
A special court in Ahmedabad which acquitted all the 67 accused in the Naroda Gam post-Godhra riots case has criticised the probe conducted into it by a Special Investigation Team (SIT) formed by the Supreme Court, and said the evidence of the prosecution's witnesses was full of contradictions and could not be relied upon.
Some BJP workers in the area have expressed unhappiness over her candidature.
'I learnt today that Bilkis Bano had to change her house after these people were released as some of them lived in her vicinity.' 'This was an injustice to her, she had to do this under duress.'
The acquittal of all 67 accused in the Naroda Gam case in which 11 members of a minority community were killed amounts to "murder" of justice and the verdict will only embolden rioters, said some of the survivors of the communal violence.
On a petition filed by former Gujarat minister Maya Kodnani, SIT judge P B Desai summoned Shah to appear before the court on September 18.
The Gujarat high court has admitted the enhancement appeal filed by the Supreme Court-appointed Special Investigation Team (through state government) in the 2002 Naroda Patiya massacre case and also condoned the delay in filing the enhancement appeal.
Justices M R Shah and K S Jhaveri ordered, "Not before me", withdrawing themselves from hearing appeals of around 29 convicts.