‘I was tortured to name PM Modi, Yogi and Bhagwat in Malegaon case,’ says Sadhvi Pragya

Former MP Sadhvi Pragya Singh Thakur, acquitted of terror charges in the Malegaon blast case on July 31 after nearly 17 years, made a shocking claim on Saturday, stating that she was “tortured and forced by the investigators to name Prime Minister Narendra Modi, UP chief minister Adityanath, RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat, and others in the case”. The former Bhopal MP said she did not name them, as it was “a clear attempt to coerce her into lying”. Thakur was acquitted along with Lieutenant Colonel Prasad Shrikant Purohit and five others by a special National Investigation Agency (NIA) court on Thursday.

The judgment in the case also revealed that a witness who had turned hostile also claimed that he was forced to implicate Yogi Adityanath and four others linked to the RSS, including Indresh Kumar, a senior functionary.

‘Take these names, and we won’t beat you’

“They made me name several people, including Ram Madhav. To do all of this, they tortured me. My lungs gave up... I was detained in a hospital illegally. All of this will be shared in the story I am writing. The truth cannot be buried. I lived in Gujarat, so they also asked me to name Prime Minister Modi (who was then Gujarat's chief minister). I did not take anyone’s name because they were trying to make me lie,” she said.

Thakur further claimed that she was also pressured to name Uttar Pradesh chief minister Yogi Adityanath, Mohan Bhagwat and Indresh Kumar.

“They said, ‘Take these names, and we won’t beat you’,” she alleged. She also accused the Congress of fabricating the case.

Apart from Sadhvi Pragya and Lt. Col. Purohit, those acquitted were Major (retired) Ramesh Upadhyay, Sudhakar Chaturvedi, Ajay Rahirkar, Sudhankar Dhar Dwivedi (Shankaracharya) and Sameer Kulkarni.

What was the Malegaon blast case?

On September 29, 2008, an explosive device strapped to a motorcycle exploded near a mosque in Muslim-dominated Malegaon during the holy month of Ramzan, killing six people and injuring over 100.

The ATS had alleged that the motorcycle used in the blast belonged to Thakur, while Lt Col Purohit brought the RDX from Jammu and Kashmir and stored it in his house.

The investigation, initially led by the Maharashtra Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS) under the late Hemant Karkare, led to the arrest of Thakur and Purohit. The ATS alleged the involvement of “saffron extremists” and linked the accused to a larger conspiracy, including other blast cases.

The case was transferred to the NIA in 2011. The NIA filed a supplementary chargesheet in May 2016, accusing the ATS of planting RDX traces to frame Purohit.