Challenging his conviction in the evidence tampering case related to the infamous 1997 Uphaar Fire tragedy case in which 59 people were killed, Gopal Ansal has approached the Delhi High Court.

Ansal’s plea was tagged in the court along with other connected matters and was listed with regular list by Justice Purushaindra Kumar Kaurav. Gopal Ansal’s conviction was upheld by the trial court on July 18. The court, on July 19 had reduced the earlier awarded sentence to the period already undergone with a provision that a fine of Rs 3 crore was paid within seven days.

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Ansal challenged the judgement passed by the trial court stating that none of the circumstances presented by the prosecution were not conclusive in nature and neither the guilt of the accused is established by the allegations. He has also submitted that there is nothing on record that conclusively suggests that offence is committed in all human probability.

In the petition, Ansal also said that the trial court, in passing the judgment was completely perverse and against the well-settled propositions of criminal and law jurisprudence. The petition challenges the conclusions drawn by the trial court as totally misconstrued and based on the misinterpretation of fact and the law on basis of surmises, presumptions, assumptions and conjectures.

It is pertinent to mention that the Association of The Victims of Uphaar Tragedy (AVUT) had approached the Delhi High Court challenging trial court’s decision that had reduced the jail term of Ansal brothers in the evidence tampering case associated with fire tragedy. The incident that shook the nation happened on June 13, 1997, during the screening of JP Dutta’s film, ‘Border’. At least 59 people lost their lives due to asphyxia. while over 100 others were left injured in the stampede that ensued.