AHMEDABAD : BJP president Amit Shah has arrived at a Gujarat court to appear as a defence witness today in a 2002 riots case in which Maya Kodnani, a leader from his party in the state, has been convicted of murder.

A judge had said last week that Mr Shah must appear today either in person or assign a lawyer to respond to Kodnani’s claim that she was not present when 11 Muslims were killed during riots in Naroda Gram, a suburb of Ahmedabad.

Kodnani, a former Gujarat minister, has already been convicted in the Naroda Patiya case and sentenced to 28 years imprisonment, is also an accused in the Naroda Gaam case, She has been found guilty of the massacre of nearly 100 Muslims in a neighbourhood called Naroda Patiya on February 28, 2002 , where 11 people had lost their lives during the Gujarat riots.
In 2012, she was convicted in the Naroda Patiya massacre case in which 97 Muslims were killed and was sentenced to life in prison. She was granted bail in 2014 after pleading that she is very unwell.
Maya Kodnani, who is a gynaecologist and was then a legislator, has said that on February 28, 2002, she was in the state assembly and then went straight to a hospital that she ran in Ahmedabad.

Kodnani, who later served as Gujarat’s Minister for Women and Child Development till she was arrested in 2009,  is one of 79 people facing trial in the case.
She has claimed that Amit Shah, who too was a Gujarat legislator then, was also present at the hospital.,She is also on trial in another case, in which she is accused of murdering 11 Muslims on the same day in Naroda Gram, just 10 km away.
Kodnani, has said Mr Shah’s testimony will help prove her alibi and repeatedly complained to the court that she was unable to contact the BJP president.  She has named other people too who she says can testify to her having been at the hospital and not in Naroda Gram on the day of the killings.
Top leaders from Gujarat BJP say that Maya Kodnani filed her application for summoning defence witnesses including Amit Shah without even speaking to them. According to reports, when Amit Shah learned that his name has also been included in the list of witnesses to be summoned, he is understood to have expressed anger and displeasure at this and even asked the state party leadership to reprimand Kodnani.
“What time did you reach the hospital? What did you see there?” asks defence counsel Amit Patel. “I reached between 9:30 pm and 9:45 pm. There was a lot of commotion and confusion. Relatives of those who died were there and the post-mortem was on.” According to a News Channel report  Amit Patel, counsel for Maya Kodnani said, “We have the address of Amit Shah’s Ahmedabad house, but he is also the national president of BJP and is not available at the residential address.

The application that my client made was limited to the fact that as of now, Amit Shah is not available at his Ahmedabad address,” said Kodnani’s counsel. When asked about how Kodnani could not trace Amit Shah, given the fact that he is the BJP President and easily accessible to BJP workers and leaders, Patel said, “I cannot comment on that.”
When asked if Maya Kodnani was present in the assembly, Amit Shah replies in the affirmative. “After the assembly got over, I received many calls from Sola Civil hospital as it was in my constituency, so I went there.” “I stayed at Naranpura and was Sarkhej MLA in 2002. On February 27, 2002, we got news of the Godhra incident,” says Amit Shah in court.
When asked where he was on February 28, 2002, the BJP leader said, “I went to the assembly at 8:30 am on that day. The Vidhan Sabha proceedings got over in about half an hour after condolences were given to Godhra victims.”
When the 2002 communal riots happened, Amit Shah was BJP MLA from Sarkhej constituency, while Maya Kodnani was MLA from Naroda constituency. Kodnani claimed in her application that MLAs and other leaders of the BJP had assembled at the Sola Civil Hospital during the time when the Naroda Gaam killings took place. She had stated in her application that Amit Shah was present at the Sola Civil Hospital where she too was present with other party leaders and hence he should be examined too. (With Agency Inputs ).

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