India News | Hathras Stampede: Court Hears Arguments on Fixing Charges, Next Hearing on Dec 21

Hathras (UP), Dec 10 (PTI) A court here heard on Tuesday arguments on fixing charges against the accused in the July 2 stampede at the religious congregation of preacher Bhole Baba and fixed December 21 as the next date for hearing in the case.

As many as 121 devotees suffocated to their deaths and bodies piled atop each other in the July 2 stampede – among the biggest such tragedies that took place at a 'satsang' of spiritual guru Narayan Sakar Hari "Bhole Baba" alias Surajpal in the district's Phulrai village.

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In October, police filed a 3,200-page charge sheet in the district court. They arrested around a dozen organisers of the event. Among those held was the main organiser Devprakash Madhukar. Surajpal was not mentioned as an accused in the case.

A P Singh, the counsel of the main accused Surajpal, said, "The arguments on the charge sheet filed by the police were heard in the court. The police have cited 674 witnesses and I asked how many years will it take to examine these witnesses."

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He argued that in this case, it is the victims who are the accused besides the organisers. "December 21 has been fixed as the next day of hearing and there will be arguments on the charge," Singh added.

Asked about the status of the bail to the accused, the lawyer said some of his clients have been granted bail by the Allahabad High Court.

"The plea for bail of Devprakash Madhukar and some others will be heard on December 17 in the Allahabad High Court. The applicants have no previous criminal history and have full faith that we will get justice from the court," he said.

Government agencies, including police, have blamed the organisers for mismanagement at the event, noting the crowd size exceeded to over 2.50 lakh from the permitted 80,000. However, Surajpal's lawyer has maintained that some "poisonous" substance sprayed by some unidentified men triggered the stampede.

On July 3, the Uttar Pradesh government formed a three-member judicial commission headed by a retired high court judge to probe the Hathras tragedy and to look into the possibility of a conspiracy behind the stampede.

On October 10, Surajpal appeared before the judicial commission in Lucknow and recorded his statement about the incident in an inquiry that lasted around two and a half hours.

The judicial panel, which was initially given a three-month timeline, was granted in October another three-month extension to complete its probe into the stampede. The probe panel is chaired by Justice (retired) Brijesh Kumar Shrivastav, with former IAS officer Hemant Rao and former IPS officer Bhavesh Kumar as its members.

(This is an unedited and auto-generated story from Syndicated News feed, LatestLY Staff may not have modified or edited the content body)