Punjab and Haryana High Court on Thursday granted bail to Swami Aseemanand, an accused in the infamous Samjhauta Express train blast case.
Though the division bench comprising Justice SS Saron and Justice Liza Gill allowed bail to Aseemanand, a member of the rightwing Hindu group ‘Abhinav Bharat’, he is unlikely to walk free since he is also facing charges in the Hyderabad Mecca Masjid and Ajmer Dargah blasts in 2007.
The High Court allowed bail to the accused on certain conditions, his counsel Satpal Jain said on Thursday after the decision, which included him not leaving the country without the court’s prior permission and attending every hearing fixed by the trial court in Panchkula. Jain also added that the accused has been asked not to influence the witnesses.
The blasts took place onboard the Indo-Pak peace train on February 18, 2007, killing as many as 68 mostly Pakistani passengers in two coaches near Panipat in Haryana.
On December 26, 2010, Aseemanand was arrested by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) from Haridwar in Uttarakhand for his alleged role in the 2007 Mecca Masjid blast in Hyderabad in which 14 persons were killed.