Godhra fire was a conspiracy: Nanavati

Commission’s report says no proof to show Modi didn’t try to control Gujarat riots.

AHMEDABAD: The Godhra train fire was a “pre-planned conspiracy”, not an accident, and neither did Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi have any role in the incident nor did he show any laxity in controlling the ensuing communal violence in the state.

With these findings, the Justice Nanavati commission, instituted to probe the 2002 Sabarmati Express fire and the riots that followed, has set the stage for another round of political confrontation over the issue. Already the Congress, its UPA allies and the Left have said they expected nothing else from a panel set up by the Modi government while the BJP declared the truth was finally out.

Fifty-nine passengers were burnt alive, 27 of them women and 10 children, in the S-6 coach of the Sabarmati Express around 8 am on February 27, 2002. Most of the victims were kar sevaks returning from Ayodhya. The incident sparked riots across the state claiming more than 1,100 lives, a majority of them Muslims.

The report of Justice GT Nanavati, a former Supreme Court judge, and retired Justice Akshay Mehta, was tabled in the Gujarat assembly on Thursday. It says the burning of the S-6 coach was a pre-planned conspiracy to attack kar sevaks, carried out at the behest of Maulvi Umarji, a leading cleric from Godhra.

The report says: “There is absolutely no evidence to show that either the chief minister or any other ministers in his council of ministers or police officers had played any role in the Godhra incident or that there was any lapse on their part in the matter of providing protection, relief and rehabilitation to the victims of communal riots or in the matter of complying with the recommendations and directions given by the National Human Rights Commission.”

Submitted to the Gujarat government on September 18, the first part of the report — Sabarmati Express Train Incident at Godhra — which runs into 168 pages has identified the main conspirators as Rajak Kurkur and Salim Panwala.

Kurkur and Maulvi are in jail while Panwala and his other alleged associates — Imran Sheri and Siraj Bala — are absconding. A red corner notice has been issued against Panwala.

Besides them, the report says, Jabir Binyamin Behra, Shaukat Lalu, Salim Jarda, Mohammad Latika, Rafik Batuk and Hasan Lalu also played a major role in the incident. Kurkur and Panwala had gone to collect 140 litres of petrol from Kalabhai’s petrol pump around 10 pm on February 26, it says.

The conspiracy was planned at Kurkur’s Aman guest house and he was present at the meeting along with Behra, Lalu, Jarda and Maulvi Umarji, the report says.

Behra, in his confession, has admitted to have gone with Panwala to the petrol pump to buy petrol that was later kept at Aman guest house, according to the report. It adds that Panwala had also inquired whether the Sabarmati Express was on time. After learning that it was four hours late, he went home and returned at 6 am on February 27, the report says.

Behra, Panwala and Lalu then went to the station where Latika had cut open the vestibule between coaches S-6 and S-7 and entered S-6 with two carboys of petrol, according to the report.

Lalu opened the door of the coach on the ‘A’ cabin side, from where Sheri, Shaukat another Batuk came inside with two more carboys of petrol, the reports says, adding that the cans were emptied in the coach.

“All the acts like procuring petrol, circulating false rumours, stopping the train and entering in coach S-6 were in accordance of the object of the conspiracy. The conspiracy hatched by these persons further appears to be a part of a larger conspiracy to create terror and de-stabilise the administration,” the report says.

One of the witnesses, Ajay Baria, had said in his police statement that Shaukat and Latika had forcibly opened the sliding door of coach S-6 leading to coach S-7 to enter S-6, the report says, adding that Hasan had thrown a burning rag into the coach that sparked the fire.

Citing statements of the passengers, the report says the train was attacked with stones for about 10 to 20 minutes and it continued till there was fire and smoke in coach S-6 (this was allegedly to prevent the passengers from coming out).

“The evidence of the passengers on this point is consistent with the evidence of the witnesses of the railway administration, including the railway police officers. The first message sent from ‘A’ cabin to the station at about 2 minutes after 8 am was that the train has been stopped and attacked. DSP Rajiv Bhargav’s evidence is that he had received the message of the stopping of the train at 8.05 am and when he was on his way to the station, he received a wireless that the coach was set on fire.”

The commission, which was set up in March 2002, has examined 46,494 affidavits. Of them, 44,475 were from the members of the public while the government filed 2,019 affidavits and 18,000 affidavits were received for relief and assistance.

The commission has examined 1,016 witnesses in all.

The commission was appointed to probe the facts and circumstances that led to fire on the Sabarmati Express near Godhra railway station and the subsequent incidents of violence in the state. The train had started from Muzaffarpur in Bihar on February 25, 2002, and was on its way to Ahmedabad. Around 2,000 ‘kar sevaks’ had boarded the train at Ayodhya.