The special CBI court will on Wednesday deliver its verdict in the Babri Masjid demolition case, 28 years after the incident.
CBI judge SK Yadav, who had directed all 32 accused to be present during the proceedings today, has arrived at the court. While BJP veterans have skipped the proceedings, Vinay Katiyar, Dharamdas, Vedanti, Lallu Singh, Champat Rai, and Pawan Pandey are among the accused who will be in the court today. While Advani, Joshi, and co-accused Nritya Gopal Das are above 80 years of age Bharti and another accused, Satish Pardhan, are in hospital.
Special CBI court judge Surendra Kumar Yadav had already issued directives to all the accused, including former Deputy PM LK Advani, BJP stalwarts Murli Manohar Joshi, form UP CM and ex-Governor of Rajasthan Kalyan Singh, former BJP lawmaker Vinay Katiyar and Uma Bharti along with 32 others.
The court tried those who were allegedly involved in the criminal conspiracy leading to the demolition of Babri mosque by frenzied kar sevaks in Ayodhya on December 6, 1992.
The court also completed all proceedings in the case by recording statements of all 32 accused. Lawyer KK Mishra, who is representing 25 out of the 32 accused in the case, including Advani, Joshi, Kalyan Singh, Uma Bharti, had also confirmed the date set by the court for delivering the verdict.
The Supreme Court had given the CBI court a one-month extension, instructing it to wind up the case by September 30. The earlier deadline for judgment had expired on August 31.
The charges of conspiracy are in addition to the existing charges against the accused of promoting enmity between different groups on grounds of religion, for which they are also facing trial. The accused are also facing charges of having made assertions “prejudicial to national integration and injuring or defiling a place of worship”. The CBI had filed a chargesheet against 49 people in the case, of whom 17 died during trial. The court recorded statements of 351 prosecution witnesses.
On April 19, 2017, the Supreme Court had ordered the special judge to conduct day-to-day trial, concluding it in two years.
The SC had termed the Allahabad High Court’s February 12, 2001 verdict dropping conspiracy charges against Advani and others as “erroneous”.
Before the 2017 verdict of the apex court, there were two sets of cases relating to the demolition, going on in Lucknow and Rae Bareli.
The first case referred to kar sevaks who were proceeded against in a Lucknow court, while the second set of cases relating to eight VIPs was being heard in a Rae Bareli court.
In April 2017, the Supreme Court transferred the Rae Bareli case to the Special CBI court in Lucknow.
While Advani and Joshi attended court proceeding and recorded statements through video conference, the rest of the accused appeared in Lucknow to record their statements.
Almost all the accused pleaded not guilty and termed it as a conspiracy hatched by their political rivals to frame them in a conspiracy case.
