Friday, June 10 2005 18:41 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

Ahmedabad: The Gujarat Government today (Jun 10, 2005) rejected the observations of the Central POTA (Prevention of Terrorism Act) Review Committee that had recommended dropping POTA charges against all the accused persons in the Godhra train carnage case.

Filing its reply before the special POTA court in Ahmedabad, the State Government's counsel H M Dhruv said, "Not only there is prima facie case under provisions of POTA but there is more than sufficient material/evidence to attract provisions of POTA."

"Under these circumstances, I request the court to proceed further against the accused persons in the present case for all the offences alleged against them", the special public prosecutor told the additional POTA court judge B S Parekh.

Detailed arguments on this reply filed by the Gujarat Government would be held on June 13.

The State Government's stand in the train carnage case got a jolt when the Central POTA Review Committee recommended that there was no need to apply the anti-terrorism law on all the accused persons as there did not appear to be any conspiracy behind the incident and they could be tried under sections of IPC and CRPC.

According to the Special Investigating Team probing the train carnage case there are 131 accused persons of which 106 have been arrested and 29 are still absconding.

Two of the accused have died natural deaths while the exact nature of the offence has not been determined on 14 of the accused.