A local court on Monday once again deferred the pronouncement of order on Zakia Jafri’s petition against SIT’s closure report that gave clean chit to Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi and others in the 2002 post-Godhra riots case.
Metropolitan Magistrate B.J. Ganatra, who was on leave on Monday, came to the court for a short time and informed the lawyers that he would pronounce the order on December 26.
Arguments on Ms. Jafri’s petition lasted five months, till September this year. On September 30, the magistrate had said he would pronounce the order on October 28, but then he deferred the pronouncement till today.
Ms. Jafri’s husband and former Congress MP Ehsan Jafri was among 69 people killed in the Gulberg Society massacre here during the 2002 riots.
The Supreme Court-appointed Special Investigation Team, which probed Ms. Jafri’s complaint naming Mr. Modi and others as being party to the conspiracy behind riots, said in its final report last February that whatever evidence it could gather was not sufficient to prosecute anybody.
Against this report, Ms. Jafri filed a petition in April this year, seeking its rejection and an order to police to file chargesheet against Mr. Modi and others.
