LUCKNOW:Rejecting the revision petition filed against the acquittal of all 32 accused, including former deputy prime minister L K Advani and the then UP CM late Kalyan Singh, in the Babri mosque demolition case, the Lucknow bench of the Allahabad High Court on Monday said it was not maintainable and directed the court offices to convert and treat the revision petition as criminal appeal.
The court posted the matter for next hearing on August 1.
Prominent among those who were acquitted by the special CBI court in the Babri demolition case on September 30, 2020, included senior BJP leaders MM Joshi, Uma Bharti, Vinay Katiyar, Sadhvi Ritambhara, the then VHP international president Ashok Singhal, Mahant Nritya Gopal Das and others.
The revision petition has been filed by two Ayodhya residents – Haji Mahmood Ahmad and Syed Akhlaq Ahmad. They claimed that they were victims of the demolition of the disputed structure.
The Babri mosque was demolished by an unruly mob on December 6, 1992.
After a long legal battle, the special CBI court on September 30, 2020 pronounced the judgment in the criminal trial exonerating all the accused.
Trial court judge Surendra Kumar Yadav had refused to take cognizance of newspaper cuttings, and video clips as evidence as the originals of the same were not produced in the court.
The judge held that the CBI could not produce any evidence that the accused had a meeting of Kar sevaks who demolished the structure.
However, petitioners rejected the special CBI court’s claim, saying that it committed error in not convicting the accused whereas ample evidence was on record.
In the revision plea, the petitioners have sought the high court to set aside the judgment of September 30, 2002, and hold all 32 accused guilty.
Assailing the findings of the trial court, the petitioners had pleaded that the court committed an error in not convicting the accused as ample evidence was on record.