Justice Ray bomb attack: HC acquits lawyer on scanty evidence

The Delhi High Court today acquitted a lawyer accused of conspiring with two Anandmargis, Santosh Anand Avdhoot and Sudevanand Avdhoot, to assassinate Chief Justice of India A N Ray near the Supreme Court in 1975, saying no inference can be drawn with a reasonable degree of certainty that he had knowledge of the plan.
Justice S P Garg said the "scanty evidence" in the case does not bring out that advocate Ranjan Dwivedi, who had represented the Anandmargis in some cases, had any involvement in the conspiracy or knowledge of the same
"The scanty evidence does not justify his conviction. The evidence on record does not bring out a high level of consciousness qua Appellant 2 (Dwivedi) in the conspiracy.

"In the light of above findings, benefit of doubt is given to him. The appeal is accepted and he is acquitted of the charge. Conviction and sentence under section 120B (conspiracy) IPC is set aside," the court said.
The court examined the four circumstances - that CJI was shown by Dwivedi to the two Anandmargis, had booked tickets under false names to enable their escape, falsely denied facts in his statement before the trial court judge and had motive to assassinate the then CJI, on which CBI had based its case against the lawyer and said these are not sufficient to prove he had knowledge of the plan to kill Justice Ray.

"The circumstances relied on by the prosecution are not sufficient at all to prove Appellant 2's involvement in the conspiracy. No inference can be drawn with a reasonable degree of certainty that he was having knowledge of the plan / conspiracy.
On whether Dwivedi had any reason to want Justice Ray killed for denying bail to the cult's leader Anand Murti, the high court said "there is no evidence that at any stage appellant 2 was agitated over the rejection of the bail."
It said the trial court's findings -- that as Dwivedi was a staunch Anandmargi, the rejection of Anand Murti's bail plea would have triggered equally strong feelings -- were "not based upon any clinching evidence".