The Supreme Court on Friday granted bail to eight convicts of the 2002 burning of coach S-6 of Sabarmati Express at Godhra railway station in Gujarat in which 59 passengers coming from Ayodhya were charred to death.
A bench of Chief Justice D Y Chandrachud, Justice Pamidighantam Sri Narasimha and Justice J B Pardiwala, while granting bail to eight accused, declined the bail plea by four others.
The Gujarat government had opposed the bail plea pointing to the gravity and seriousness of the crime committed by them. It had also told the court that since they were convicted under TADA, they were not entitled to the grant of remission of sentence.
The state government had sought the restoration of death sentences to 11 convicts, whose death sentences in the 2002 Godhra train-burning case were commuted to life imprisonment by the State High Court.
59 passengers lost their lives when coach S-6 of Sabarmati Express was torched at the Godhra Railway Station in Gujarat on February 27, 2002. The incident had triggered large-scale riots in Gujarat.
A local court in 2011 convicted 31 accused and acquitted 63 people. Eleven accused were given death sentences while the rest were awarded life imprisonment.
Later, the Gujarat High Court upheld the trial court decision to convict the 31 accused but commuted the death sentence of the 11 to life imprisonment.
The convicts had moved the top court challenging the Gujarat High Court order.