Overview
- The Bombay High Court, in an order on Wednesday, quashed a special NIA court’s charges and discharged Rajendra Chaudhary, Lokesh Sharma, Dhan Singh and Manohar Ram Singh Narwaria.
- The bench said the case rested on circumstantial material, retracted confessions including one attributed to Swami Aseemanand, hearsay about bicycle buys, and no eyewitness who placed the men at the scene.
- The judges called the probe a dead end after finding the ATS–CBI version and the later NIA narrative could not be reconciled, and questioned why the NIA gathered no fresh evidence after taking over in 2011.
- The court criticized the trial judge for showing no application of judicial mind when framing charges, and noted there was no clear way to ignore earlier ATS and CBI material that pointed to a different set of suspects.
- The ruling leaves no one on trial for the blasts that killed 31 and injured over 300 in Malegaon, and victims’ families now wait to see if authorities appeal or reopen investigative steps.