2008 Malegaon blasts case: Mumbai court rejects NIA plea for in-camera proceedings

Mumbai, Oct 01: A Special Court in Mumbai on Tuesday rejected the National Investigation Agency's (NIA) plea for an in-camera trial of the 2008 Malegaon blast case in which BJP MP Pragya Thakur is one of the accused. The court reserved the right to allow either full or partial proceedings to be reported of truncated witnesses.

Conducting the trial in a "transparent manner" was among the reasons for rejecting the NIA's plea, said Judge V S Padalkar while hearing the plea.

During in-camera hearing, the proceedings are not made known to the media or the members of the public. It is conducted in private with only the judge, lawyers, accused and witnesses concerned in attendance.

On October 30, 2018, the special court had framed charges of murder, abetment and conspiracy in the case against the seven accused including Lieutenant Colonel Prasad Purohit, Sadhvi Pragya Singh Thakur, Sameer Kulkarni, retired major Ramesh Upadhyay, Sudhakar Chaturvedi, Ajay Rahilkar and Sudhakar Chaturvedi.

The seven will face trial under anti-terror law Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act and other sections, including murder, the criminal conspiracy of the Indian Penal Code.

On September 29, 2008, seven people are killed and 101 injured after a bomb planted on a motorcycle goes off in Maharashtra's Malegaon, about 200 km from here.