Muzaffarnagar: A local court on Friday awarded life imprisonment to all the seven convicts, accused of killing two people in Kawal village in an attack which is believed to have triggered the 2013 Muzaffarnagar riots.
The seven convicts – Muzammil, Mujassim, Furkan, Nadeem, Jahangir, Afzal and Iqbal – are accused of killing two people named Gaurav and Sachin, and rioting in Kawal village on August 27, 2013. Earlier on Wednesday, a local court in Muzaffarnagar had convicted the seven people in connection to the incident.
The clashes that broke out in Muzaffarnagar and Shamli districts of Uttar Pradesh between the Hindu and Muslim communities claimed 62 lives while injuring 93 others and rendering more than 50,000 homeless. The riots took place over a minor altercation between Hindu and Muslim youths at Kawal village in Muzaffarnagar district.
Described as the “the worst violence in Uttar Pradesh in recent history,” the 2013 riots saw the Indian Army deployed in the state for the first time in 20 years.
