Congress, NCP demand reinvestigation of Hashimpura massacre

Three national-level parties have demanded a reinvestigation of the 1987 massacre of 40 Muslim males in Hashimpura.

Leaders and activists the Congress Party, the Janata Dal (United) and the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) staged a protest in this regard today.

"A SIT (Special Investigation Team) must be formed under the supervision of a Supreme Court judge and a re-investigation must be initiated," said Congress leader K. Rahman Khan.

Earlier in March, due to lack of evidence, a New Delhi court had acquitted the 16 police personnel accused of perpetrating the massacre.

The acquitted belonged to the Uttar Pradesh Provincial Armed Constabulary (PAC) force.

The court said the prosecution had not been able to establish the identity of the suspected policemen. It ordered the rehabilitation of the family members of the dead victims and survivors be referred to the legal services authority.

The Hashimpura massacre took place on May 22, 1987, during the Hindu-Muslim riots in Meerut, Uttar Pradesh. Nineteen PAC personnel allegedly rounded up 42 Muslim youth from the Hashimpura locality of the city, took them in truck to the outskirts, near Murad Nagar, in Ghaziabad District, shot them at point-blank range and dumped their bodies in nearby water canals.

A few days later, dead bodies were found floating in the canals.

In May 2000, 16 of the 19 accused surrendered, and were later released on bail, while three were already dead.

The trial of the case was transferred by the Supreme Court of India in 2002 from Ghaziabad to a Sessions Court at the Tis Hazari complex in Delhi, where it is the oldest pending case. The charge sheet in the case was filed before chief judicial magistrate of Ghaziabad in 1996.