The Supreme Court on Wednesday ordered that senior BJP leader L K Advani and Murli Manohar Joshi be tried on criminal conspiracy charges in relation with the 1992 Babri demolition case in Lucknow.
The bench had also said since 25 years have already passed, in the interest of justice, it would consider ordering time-bound trial on day-to-day basis, to be completed preferably within two years.
The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), which is prosecuting the Babri demolition cases, had appealed against the high court's order.
However, another accused in the case Kalyan Singh, who was BJP's chief minister of Uttar Pradesh when the mosque was demolished and is now the governor of western state of Rajasthan, will be prosecuted once he demits the constitutional office. It also instructed that separate trials that are being conducted in Raebareli and Lucknow would be clubbed and held only in the Uttar Pradesh capital. The trial judge will not be transferred till the case is over and there will be no adjournments given.
The court also directed Lucknow trial court to commence proceedings in 4 weeks and made it clear that there will be no de novo trial.
The other case was against lakhs of "karsevaks" (volunteers) who were in and around the disputed structure.
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On April 6 before reserving the order, the top court bench had indicated that as far as conspiracy charge was concerned it may invoke extraordinary powers under the Constitution's Article 142 and transfer the ongoing trial from Rae Bareli to Lucknow so that eight leaders, including Advani and Joshi, could be tried for conspiracy along with 13 others.
The second set of case was against unknown "karsevaks" who were in and around the disputed structure and pulled it down.
The SC ordered that the trial would be conducted in both Lucknow and Rae Bareli.
The Rae Bareilly case accuses Advani, Joshi and six other BJP and Sangh Parivar leaders of giving provocative speeches which promoted enimity and threatened national integration.
A supplementary charge sheet was filed against eight persons but not the 13 who were discharged for plotting the demolition. So, the senior BJP leaders can appeal to a higher court and eventually the Supreme Court. The CBI filed an appeal against the order in the High Court, which upheld the verdict in 2010. India's top court said Wednesday, April 19, 2017, that the four senior leaders of India's ruling Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party will stand trial for their role in a criminal conspiracy over the destruction of the 16th century Babri mosque in 1992, an event that sparked bloody nationwide rioting. It had then added charges under IPC section 120B (criminal conspiracy) which was quashed by the lower court.
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