SC grants bail to 4 jailed in Gujarat riots, says 'conviction order debatable'

New Delhi: Four convicts in the Naroda Patiya case, which describes one of the worst massacres in the 2002 Gujarat riots, have been granted bail by the Supreme Court, which has doubted their conviction.

"The conviction order is debatable," the Supreme Court said while granting them bail on Tuesday.

A bench headed by Justice A M Khanwilkar Tuesday granted bail to the four convicts -- Umeshbhai Surabhai Bharwad, Rajkumar, Padmendrasinh Jaswantsinh Rajput and Harshad alias Mungda Jila Govind Chhara Parmar.

They are serving a 10-year jail term for arson and rioting. The Gujarat High Court had on April 20 last year upheld the conviction of 12 out of the 29 accused who were pronounced guilty on various charges by the trial court and had acquitted 17 others, including former BJP minister Maya Kodnani.

The rioting had taken place on February 28, 2002, in the Naroda Patiaya area of Ahmedabad where a mob had killed 97 people, most of them from a minority community. The massacre had taken place a day after the torching of the Sabarmati Express at Godhra, which had triggered state-wide riots.

(With PTI inputs)