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Journalism of Courage
Former Gujarat minister Maya Kodnani, who is serving a life te-rm in connection with the 2002 Naroda Patiya massacre case, sought regular bail from the Gujarat High Court on Tuesday. The division bench of Justices A S Dave and Sonia Gok-ani, however, recused themselves from the case. Kodnani’s lawyer, Mitesh Amin, said the matter is likely to be taken up on Wednesday. He said the bail application has been filed solely on the grounds of merit.
Challenging the witnesses for giving “embellished statements” against her, Kodnani moved the bail plea even as her petition challenging the the judgment of the special court has been pending before the Gujarat High Court since December 2012. In August 2012, a Special SIT court had awarded life imprisonment to Kodnani, Bajrang Dal leader Babu Bajrangi and 29 other convicts in connection with the 2002 riots at Naroda Patiya in which 97 people were brutally killed. The court had named Kodnani, a minister in former Gujarat Chief Minster Narendra Modi’s Cabinet, as “a kingpin of riots”. Kodnani was the MLA of Naroda at the time of riots. She was made Minister of State for Women and Child Development in 2007. The three-time legislator is the first woman to be convicted in a post-Godhra riots case.
