2006 Malegaon blasts: Aseemanand, Sadhvi Pragya’s names missing from NIA chargesheet

NEW DELHI: The NIA chargesheet in the 2006 Malegaon blasts case has skipped any mention of Swami Aseemanand, the man who blew the lid on involvement of Hindu terror operatives in attacking the communally-sensitive town, as the agency is yet to lay hands on any credible evidence linking him to the conspiracy. Similar limitations also led a cautious NIA to avoid any reference to Sadhvi Pragya Thakur, an accused in the 2008 Malegaon blasts.

The filing of NIA charge sheet confirming the Hindu terror link to the 2006 attacks has paved the way for the nine Muslim youth chargesheeted earlier by the Maharashtra ATS but later released on bail, to move court for their discharge in the case. While seven of the nine men were released on bail after serving around five years in prison, two are still incarcerated as they are also accused in the 7/11 Mumbai local train blasts.

Aseemanand, who then headed the RSS-affiliated Vanvasi Kalyan Ashram in Dangs, and Thakur were part of a June 2006 conspiracy meeting at Valsad in Gujarat that plotted Hindu terror strikes, including the blasts at Malegaon. It was at this meeting that Aseemanand, chargesheeted in the Samjhauta train bombing and Mecca Masjid blasts, propounded his "bomb-for-a-bomb" theory before like-minded members of radical Hindu outfit Abhinav Bharat, and chose Malegaon as a target. The "conspiracy-hatching" session was attended by Sunil Joshi, an RSS pracharak who was later murdered in 2007, Ramchandra Kalsangra, Sandeep Dange, Lokesh Sharma and Amit Hakla. While Lokesh Sharma was named as an accused, along with three others, in the NIA chargesheet filed on Wednesday, Kalsangra, Dange and Amit Hakla have been included as absconding accused.

An NIA official told TOI that the agency had found nothing concrete so far to directly link Aseemanand to the conspiracy behind the Malegaon attack of September 8, 2006. "We cannot go by his confessional statement, from which he has already backtracked...we need hard evidence on the basis of which he can be prosecuted," the official said but added that NIA probe was still on and more accused could be added in a supplementary chargesheet.

As for Thakur, the courts are yet to give NIA permission for her custodial interrogation.