Historic judgment: M M Joshi after acquittal in Babri demolition case

New Delhi, Sep 30: Senior BJP leader Murli Manohar Joshi, who was an accused in the Babri Masjid demolition case, has welcomed a CBI special court's verdict acquitting all the 32 accused in the case.

"It's a historic decision by the court. This proves that no conspiracy was hatched for December 6 incident in Ayodhya. Our program and rallies were not part of any conspiracy. We are happy, everyone should now be excited about Ram Mandir's construction, said Joshi.

All the 32 accused in the Babri mosque demolition case, including BJP veterans L K Advani and MM Joshi, were on Wednesday acquitted by a special CBI court here.

The court said there was no conclusive proof against the accused.

The case relates to the razing of the disputed structure in Ayodhya on December 6, 1992.

The 32 accused persons were former deputy prime minister Advani, former Union minister Joshi and Uma Bharti, former Uttar Pradesh chief minister Kalyan Singh, during whose tenure the structure was pulled down, besides Vinay Katiyar and Sadhvi Rithambara.

Champat Rai, the general secretary of the trust in charge of constructing the temple, were also among the accused.

The CBI, which went into the case, produced 351 witnesses and 600 documents as evidence before the court. Charges were framed against 48 people, but 16 had died during the course of the trial. Over two dozen of 32 accused were present.

Advani (92), Joshi (86), Bharti (61), Singh (88), Nritya Gopal Das and Satish Pradhan were not present in court.