Mumbai, Jul 21 (PTI) As the Bombay High Court on Monday acquitted all the 12 accused in the 2006 Mumbai train bomb blasts, survivors of the horrific terror attack reacted with deep shock and disappointment as their wait for closure and justice got longer, 19 years on.
Chirag Chauhan, a blasts survivor who is now wheelchair-bound and a practising CA, expressed dismay over the acquittal ruling and rued “Justice got killed”.
Hours after the verdict, Chauhan (40) took to social media platform X to express his deep disappointment over the verdict and maintained “the law of the land failed today”.
Nineteen years after seven blasts on suburban trains in Mumbai killed more than 180 persons and injured several other, the HC acquitted all the 12 accused, saying the prosecution “utterly failed” to prove the case and it was “hard to believe the accused committed the crime”.
“Today is a very sad day for everyone! Justice got killed!! No one got punished for the irreparable damage and pain suffered by thousands of families!!,” Chauhan said in a post on X.
Highlighting that he has forgiven the terrorists responsible for the blasts and moved on with his life, the chartered accountant (CA), however, noted justice could have been served in the case had Narendra Modi been Prime Minister then.
“I wish we had Shri Narendra Modi at the time as our PM, we could have got justice like in the recent terror attack (an apparent reference to Pahalgam carnage). Bharat went inside Pakistan and gave a befitting reply to terrorists & all perpetrators!” he stated in an oblique refence to ‘Operation Sindoor’ conducted by armed forces in May.
As a 21-year-old chartered accountancy student, Chauhan was travelling on a local train on the Western Railway when it was rocked by a powerful bomb blast between Khar and Santacruz stations on July 11, 2006.
He was paralysed due to spinal cord injury suffered in the terror attack and is now uses a wheelchair.
Another survivor, Mahendra Pitale (52), a Western Railway employee, opined that he does not agree with the verdict that has come 19 years after the terror attack.
Only the police machinery and courts know what exactly happened, he stated.
Pitale, who was 33 years old when he lost his left hand when a powerful bomb exploded in the train he was travelling on at suburban Jogeshwari, questioned who was responsible for the dastardly act if those tried have been let off.
“If those who have been acquitted are not the real culprits behind the serial blasts, then who are the real culprits and when will they be punished or will it also take 19 more years?” he asked with a sense of resignation.
Gardening contractor Harish Powar (44), another survivor of the blasts, called the verdict shocking.
“The accused got justice, not the victims, who lost their lives or limbs in the blasts,” he said.
Powar, a resident of Virar in Palghar district who travels daily to south Mumbai on suburban locals for operating his horticulture business, was injured when a bomb blast ripped through the first-class coach of the train he was travelling on.
“The blast scene keeps cropping up in front of my eyes even after almost two decades. I remember bodies lying inside the compartment with blood splattered on its walls. Some people were writhing in pain, while a few others were lying motionless,” Powar told PTI.
With tears in their eyes and grief still etched in every word, the parents of Harshal Bhalerao (23), one of the victims of the bombings, expressed deep sorrow and disappointment over the acquittal of the accused.
Talking to the media in Thane city, Harshal’s parents Yashwant and Saguna Bhalerao said it feels like their son has died all over again.
“We waited for justice for 19 years, but in the end, the accused were allowed to walk free. The government failed (us). The investigation was weak. The system gave up on us,” rued Yashwant Bhalerao, unable to hide his anguish.
Harshal Bhalerao had just joined a private company in Andheri, and July 11, 2006, was his first day at work. Excited and full of dreams, he boarded a crowded Virar-bound train that evening unaware that terror would claim his life within minutes.
Ironically, his father was also on the same train, in another coach, returning from work.
“I was in the same train. I remember the sound, the screams, the chaos. I searched everywhere – the tracks, the hospitals. When I finally found Harshal, it was his lifeless body I had to take home,” said Yashwant Bhalerao, his voice cracking.
To honour their only son’s memory, the Bhaleraos later built a small home in Vasai and named it ‘7/11 Harshal Smriti’. It was not just a tribute, but a promise — a promise that justice would one day be served in his name, but that was not to be.
“We named our house after the date that changed our lives forever. It was supposed to be a symbol of remembrance and hope. But now, we feel cheated by the very system we trusted,” Yashwant Bhalerao said.
Saguna Bhalerao sobbed uncontrollably and asked, “They hanged the terrorist of 26/11. Why was our case forgotten? Are our children not worth justice too? We may never get Harshal back. But at least the culprits should have been punished. Now we have nothing – not our son, not even justice.” For the Bhaleraos, the wounds of 7/11 will never heal.
“The nation moved on. The headlines faded. But we lived this pain every single day for 19 years. And now, we are asked to accept that no one was responsible (for blasts),” Yashwant Bhalerao said. PTI KK DC COR NSK RSY
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