Samjhauta Express blast case: Swami Aseemanand, 3 others acquitted

Twelve years after the deadly Samjhauta Express blast killed 68 persons and wounded dozens more, a special court in Panchkula on Wednesday acquitted all four persons, including RSS activist Swami Aseemanand. The NIA court also dismissed an application filed by Pakistan national Rahila Wakeel to depose in the case as an eyewitness, which brought in a curious twist to the 2007 case.

NIA counsel RK Handa told DNA that the court concluded that the probe agency had failed to prove any connection of the accused with the conspiracy and hence they deserve benefit of doubt. "The court observed that the evidence placed on record had shortcomings. It acquitted Swami Aseemanand, Lokesh Sharma, Kamal Chauhan and Rajinder Chaudhary, saying no charges could be proved," he said, adding that the agency was brought in to investigate only three years after the blast in 2010. "NIA came into the picture quite late, and so missed out on the evidence one could have gathered during the initial investigation."

Aseemanand, the 67-year-old preacher, was in court at 5.30 pm, when the acquittal was sounded by the court. He was earlier accused by the anti-terror probe agency of conspiracy in the 2007 Ajmer Sharif Dargah blast and the Hyderabad Mecca Masjid blast. While the courts had cleared his involvement in the other two cases, this was the only case pending against him.

Meanwhile, Wakeel's counsel Momin Malik expressed his disappointment with the acquittal verdict, and said that there was a chance that they will move the high court.