Aurangzeb Alamgir
Indian National Investigation Agency’s (NIA’s) special court gave the clean chit to all four accused in the Samjhota Express bombing case and the application filed by Pakistani resident Rahila Wakel is also dismissed. According to the verdict by NIA court the investigating agency has failed to prove the conspiracy charge and ruled that the accused deserve a benefit of the doubt. On February 18, 2007, nearly 70 passengers were killed in the blasts on train which was headed from Delhi to Lahore and most of the passengers were Pakistani nationals. It is worth mentioning that the incident took place near Panipat in Haryana where back in 1761 Hindu Maratha Empire got defeat and lost their suzerainty over Punjab by Muslim ruler Ahmad Shah Durrani.
In 2007, when this incident happened initially India attempted to malign ISI/Pakistan by alleging Islamic Movement of India (IMI) connection. But later on extremist Hindu hand unearthed and a serving Colonel named Col Srikant provided the explosives which were used in the attack. According to reports Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) elements were also involved in the plot and their rep Sunil Joshi and his two companions were the part of this act of terrorism and lately Joshi was murdered during investigation phase. And this is the clear indication that Indian government was willing to clean all the leading evidence of RSS’s involvement in the attack.
On Pakistani side the judgment was highly condemned and declared it as an “extreme threat” for Muslims in India. Acting foreign secretary of Pakistan said that the judgment is the reflection of Indian state policy of promoting and protecting Hindu terrorism. According to Pakistani MOFA it is very hard to face the families of victims of this act of terrorism. The spokesperson of MOFA said that the Foreign Office was gathering details regarding the development and will soon release a statement in response to the verdict.
Now the question arises that whether this acquittal could be challenged in some higher courts or not? But in my opinion it will not be fruitful because when the acquittal of Ajmer Dargah and Mecca Masjid case were challenged in 2007 the verdict remained unchanged. Similarly, earlier in 2015 Pakistan had protested India’s decision to not oppose bail for the prime accused in the case. Pakistan expects India to take steps to bring to justice all those involved in the heinous act of terrorism on the Samjhota Express. Pakistan also suspects the involvement of Colonel Srikant, a serving Indian Army officer, in the Samjhota Express blasts and he was exposed by Maharashtra Anti-Terrorism Squad in 2018 on suppling the RDX used in the Samjhota Express bombing.
If we meticulously observe the cases like Samjhota express then we will observe that kangaroo courts in India issue the decisions with the tilt and biasness towards Hindu extremists. Starting from Gujarat massacre in which thousands of Muslims were brutally slaughtered while ironically they not only failed to get justice and but also received set back when the butcher of Gujarat Narinder Modi elected as the prime minister. Similarly in Babri Masjid incident, Indian Muslims could not get their right of freedom. These kinds of cases are the bigger question marks on the faces of democratic and rising and shining India. Today under Modi regime the situation is very much worrisome regarding minorities in India. The secular face of India is deforming and getting worse. India is quickly shifting from era of secularism to era of saffron terrorism. Under the radical ideology of Hindutva, Muslims, Sikhs, Christians, Dalits and the secular elements of Indian society are threatened.
Samjhota Express case is the litmus test of RSS’s act of Saffron terrorism. The verdict reveals that how Modi government, Indian judiciary and Indian investigation agencies are executing the vicious plans of radical Hindu mindset. In today’s India nobody can find Gandhi’s ideology of “Truth” or “Satya” and “Ahinsa” or “Non-Violence”. Rather Modi Sarkar is following the footsteps of Nathuram Godse, the extremist Hindu activist who murdered Mr. Gandhi.
