SC waives off Zaheera's Rs 50,000 perjury fine

New Delhi, Mar 7 (UNI) The Supreme Court today waived off the fine of Rs 50,000 imposed on Best Bakery carnage prime witness Zaheera Sheikh for perjury.

A bench comprising Justices Arijit Passayat and H K Sema waived off the fine, on a petition by Zaheera -- whose one year sentence for imprisonment ends today and is due to be released tomorrow -- in which she pleaded she could not pay the amount due to her extreme poverty, coupled with the fact that the apex court had ordered her bank accounts to be frozen.

The court noted that in view of the totality of facts and circumstances, it was waiving off the fine, imposed when Zaheera was convicted by it on March 8 last year. It had then ruled that in case, the fine was not paid, Zaheera would have to undergo an additional one year spell of imprisonment.

Zaheera was convicted of contempt of court, as it was based on her statement that the apex court ordered a re-investigation and re-trial of the case, under Article 142 of the Constitution, on the grounds that the witnesses were being threatened and pressurised by BJP MLA Madhur Srivastava, who was one of the accused.

The Best Bakery case was the trial of those accused of murdering 14 people in the attack on the Vadodara-based bakery on March 1, 2002, during the riots following the attack on the S-6 coach of the Sabarmati Express at Godhra station in which 58 kar sewaks were burnt to death.

The entire process of the re-investigation and re-trial was based on the statement of Zaheera, which also sought a retrial outside Gujarat, but from which she later backed out.

The retrial -- first in the country after a court verdict and the appeal being dismissed by the Gujarat High Court -- was held in Mumbai and saw conviction of nine of the accused, and life imprisonment being awarded to them, while another eight were acquitted, in its judgement on February 24 last year.

UNI