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Download An Indian court recently released seven Muslim youth on bail who were accused of carrying out bomb blasts that killed 37 people in the Western state of Maharashtra in 2006.

The accused have spent five years in jail and were granted bail after the investigating agency told the court that they now suspect Hindu extremist groups to be behind the blasts.

In the past few years there have been many cases of wrongful accusation and detention of Muslims raising serious doubts about the credibility of police.

Bismillah Geelani reports from New Dehli.

In the Muslim majority town of Malegaon, people flocked to the streets to celebrate the release of seven local men from prison after five years.

People burst firecrackers, hugged each other and handed out sweets to express their joy.

Mohammad Suleiman is a local resident.

“For us the happiest day is Eid but today is even happier because our children have been released. They are totally innocent still they had to suffer all this. They were brutally tortured and put behind bars all these years but today they are back with us, there can’t be happier moment than this.”

The seven men were arrested in 2006 by the Anti-terrorist Squad (ATS) soon after bomb blasts at a local Mosque and Muslim graveyard killed 34 people.  

The authorities said they have conclusive evidence of their involvement in the bombing but the accused insisted they were innocent.

28 year old Abrar Ahmed a local businessman was one of the accused. 

“None of us has anything to do with the blast. It was a conspiracy against us. We were all framed, declared guilty and thrown into jail. I know the police officers who did it but I don’t know why they did it.’

The majority of the local Muslims also find it difficult to believe that Muslims could have attacked their own places of worship and killed their own people.

Hifzurrahman leads the prayers in the local mosque.

“The Mosque and the graveyard are places which are held in high respect among all Muslim sects. We can’t even imagine that a Muslim would do such things at these places.

Even the victims of the bomb blasts don’t believe the police’s story.

Mohammad Imran lost his two teenage sons in the blasts in 2006.

“The police had prepared the sketches of the suspects after the blast but they do not resemble with any of the people who were arrested. However the sketches of Hindu extremists which have now been released are similar to those."

The case is now with the National Investigation Agency (NIA) and it says the Muslim youth have been wrongfully accused.  

The agency is now saying it has evidence that the blast was carried out by Hindu extremist groups.

This revelation came as a huge embarrassment for both the investigators and the government.

B. Raman is former director of the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI ).

“It does create an embarrassment for the investigating agencies because instead of waiting till they collect all the evidence they were a bit too hasty in projecting these terrorist attacks as caused by Jihadist elements, now the investigation is pointing in a different direction, they are pointing towards the involvement of some members of the Hindu community. So it is definitely going to affect the credibility of the Indian investigating agencies in their interaction with the investigating and intelligence agencies of other countries.”

Shoma Chowdhary, editor of the weekly news magazine Tehelka says it exposes the systemic bias against the Muslim minority.

“Not every Muslim is a terrorist but every terrorist is a Muslim, which was such a maxim and actually there was an unseemly haste in the manner boys were picked up. Within hours of every blast, you would have press handout that the case has been cracked and the masterminds have been caught, so that bias actually went across the system.”

While the government acknowledges that the Muslim men have been wronged it holds the media responsible for this.

Salman Khurshid is Law Minister

“The problem really lies in the media wanting to know too much too soon. We put too much pressure on the investigative agencies to come up with something, to tell something, to make it public and it causes irreversible damage to some people. And I would urge that we ought to show a little more restraint in these matters, ultimately the truth will come out only when the trial is completed.”

But senior journalist Praveen Swami defends the media.

“I find it a little strange that the communalization of our public life is somehow being blamed on the media. We do not independently go away and investigate crimes, we are not criminal investigators. We rely on what investigators are telling us and we clearly attribute it to the people who are telling us this information. I think we try by and large to do a balanced job.”

While the seven accused men have been released they haven’t been fully acquitted as the trial hasn’t yet ended. It has already been going on for five years and may continue for another five more.