THREE WOMEN IDENTIFIED FOR HELPING GUJARAT RIOTERS

Shabbirmiyan Sindhi, key witness in the Deepda Darwaza case of the 2002 Gujarat riots has identified three women for having supplied kerosene and petrol to the mob to burn those killed in Mehsana’s Visnagar taluka. Gita Babulal Patel, Madhu Ajitkumar Patel and Manjula Ramesh Patel are all aged between 40 and 45 years, says the chargesheet. Sindhi, who identified the three during the ongoing trial in the special designated court, said they lived near his neighbourhood and he saw them supplying kerosene and petrol to the mob when his family and others were being hacked to death. A total of 14 people, including five children, were killed and their houses were burnt during the 2002 Gujarat riots in Deepda Darwaza area. “The women are close relatives of the accused in the case. They all stay in the same area,” said special public prosecutor P.R. Agrawal. The three, at present, are out on bail, and not the first women to be identified for active participation in the communal killings. Former state minister and BJP MLA Maya Kodnani is also facing trial for abetting rioters in Naroda Gam. Yunus Miyan Qureshi, one of the key prosecution witnesses, had disclosed that on the day of the attack, he saw Kodnani in a Maruti car around 1 pm, handing kerosene containers to rioters.