All India Majilis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) president and Loksabha MP Asaduddin Owaisi on Wednesday said ‘’U-turn by National Investigation Agency(NIA) on the Malegaon blast case is a joke and travesty of justice’’.
He also accused NIA of playing politics at the diktat of the political masters and on the dead bodies of 37 people who were killed in the blast.
He was interacting with mediapersons at the party headquarters Darussalam on NIA’s latest move opposing the discharge application of nine Muslims arrested in the Malegaon blast case.
‘’Now the trail will run on what basis? Who are the main perpetrators Nine Muslims or eight Hindus? How will the trail run now? he questioned.
Section 6 of NIA Act is very clear and says that when a scheduled offence takes place, another investigation agency has no role whatsoever. After the case was taken over by NIA, the Maharashtra ATS and the CBI had no role in it, Owaisi added.
“Look at the sequence. Public prosecutor Rohini Salian was pressurized by NIA to go soft on the accused, The witnesses’ statements of 2008 Malegaon blast are missing. The Mecca masjid bomb blast accused Swami Aseemanand got bail as the central government and law enforcing agencies could not file a petition opposing bail in the higher court of law. Ajmer blast witnesses are turning hostile and we don't know what's happening in Samjhauta blast case. So this is very clear-cut message that in terrorist cases, if there is a non-Muslim, the present political dispensation is going soft on them,” Owaisi charged.
He demanded that Central Government should immediately discharge those nine Muslim youths because a party may come to power and go but the government is a continuous entity.
‘’In the interest of justice to ensure that the miscarriage of justice does not take place and to ensure that real perpetrators are convicted and sentenced to toughest of the conviction, this thing should not happen,” he said.
Owaisi hopes that the government would accept the discharge petition in the interest of justice and allow the trial to proceed.