This event is always in Canadian News....
Here's a brief history.
Air India Flight 182 was an Air India flight operating on the Montréal-London-Delhi-Bombay route. On 23 June 1985, the airplane operating on the route was blown up in midair by a bomb in Irish airspace. The incident represents the largest mass murder in modern Canadian history. The explosion and downing of the carrier occurred within an hour of the related Narita Airport Bombing.
The plane, a Boeing 747-237B (c/n 21473/330, reg VT-EFO) named Emperor Kanishka, exploded at an altitude of 31,000 feet (9,400 m) and crashed into the Atlantic Ocean. While some passengers survived the initial explosion and subsequent decompression, none survived the impact. In all, 329 people perished, among them 280 Canadian nationals, mostly of Indian birth or descent, and 22 Indians.
Investigation and prosecution took almost 20 years and was the most expensive trial in Canadian history, costing nearly CAD $130 million. A special Commission found the accused perpetrators not guilty and they were released. The only person convicted of involvement in the bombing was Inderjit Singh Reyat, who pleaded guilty in 2003 to manslaughter in constructing the bomb used on Flight 182 and received a five-year sentence. He was refused parole in July 2007.
The bomb killed all 22 crew and 307 passengers. Post-accident medical reports graphically illustrated the outcomes of the passengers and crew. Of the 329 persons on board, 131 bodies were recovered; 198 were lost at sea.
Air India Trial
The trial of those accused of the bombing, Sikh separatists Ripudaman Singh Malik and Ajaib Singh Bagri, became known as the "Air India Trial".
[edit] Reyat's Narita conviction
On 10 May 1991, after lengthy proceedings to extradite Reyat from England, he was convicted of two counts of manslaughter and four explosives charges relating to the Narita Airport bombing. He was sentenced to 10 years imprisonment.
[edit] Malik and Bagri charged
Fifteen years after the bombing, on 27 October 2000, RCMP arrested Malik and Bagri. They were charged with 329 counts of first-degree murder in the deaths of the people on board Air India Flight 182, conspiracy to commit murder, the attempted murder of passengers and crew on the Canadian Pacific flight at Japan's New Tokyo International Airport (now Narita International Airport), and two counts of murder of the baggage handlers at New Tokyo International Airport.
Reyat turns witness
On 6 June 2001, RCMP arrested Reyat on charges of murder, attempted murder, and conspiracy in the Air India bombing. On 10 February 2003, Reyat pleaded guilty to one count of manslaughter and a charge of aiding in the construction of a bomb. He was sentenced to five years in prison. He was expected to provide testimony in the trial of Malik and Bagri, but prosecutors were vague.
The trial proceeds between April 2003 to December 2004 in Courtroom 20, more commonly-known as "the Air India courtroom". At a cost of $7.2 million, the high-security courtroom was specially-built for the trial in the Vancouver Law Courts.
Verdict
On 16 March 2005, Justice Ian Josephson found Malik and Bagri not guilty on all counts, since the evidence was inadequate:
"I began by describing the horrific nature of these cruel acts of terrorism, acts which cry out for justice. Justice is not achieved, however, if persons are convicted on anything less than the requisite standard of proof beyond a reasonable doubt. Despite what appear to have been the best and most earnest of efforts by the police and the Crown, the evidence has fallen markedly short of that standard."
Murdered witness
Tara Singh Hayer, the publisher of the Indo-Canadian Times and a member of the Order of British Columbia, had provided an affidavit to the RCMP in 1995 claiming that he was present during a conversation in which Bagri admitted his involvement in the bombings.[33]
While at the London offices of fellow Sikh newspaper publisher Tarsem Singh Purewal, Hayer claims he overheard a meeting between Purewal and Bagri. In that meeting Hayer claims that Bagri stated that "if everything had gone as planned the plane would have blown up at Heathrow airport with no passengers on it. But because the plane was a half hour to three quarters of an hour late, it blew up over the ocean."
On 24 January of the same year, Purewal was killed near the offices of the Des Pardes newspaper in Southall, England, leaving Hayer as the only other witness.
On 18 November 1998, Hayer was shot dead while getting out of his car in the garage of his home in Surrey. His statement is now inadmissible as evidence in court. Hayer had previously survived an earlier attempt made on his life in 1988 but was paralyzed and thereafter used a wheelchair. As a consequence of his murder, the affidavit was inadmissible in court.
25 saal ho chalay...the victims' families are still awaiting justice.
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