31 convicted, get life term

An Indian court yesterday jailed 31 Hindus for life for killing 33 Muslims in a single house during savage religious riots in the state of Gujarat in 2002.
They were found guilty of murder, attempted murder, arson, rioting and criminal conspiracy after the 33 people were burned alive in a building.
Judge SC Srivastava awarded life term to them in a special court near Sardarpura village, where the victim Muslims sought shelter in a small house on the night of February 28, 2002.
Another 42 mostly Hindu defendants were acquitted yesterday because of a lack of evidence.
Those convicted yesterday can appeal to a higher court.
The victims had crowded into a house to escape the rioters, who set the building alight. Bodies of 28 people were found at the scene, with five others dying later of their injuries.
In some of India's worst inter-faith violence since independence in 1947, about 2,000 people died in the wave of anti-Muslim unrest triggered by a train fire in which 60 Hindu pilgrims on a train were burnt alive in 2002.
It was one of India's worst outbreaks of communal violence in recent years.
The Hindu pilgrims on the train were returning from the town of Ayodhya, another flashpoint for inter-religion unrest after a mosque was razed in 1992 by Hindu zealots, leading to separate riots that killed thousands of people, mostly Muslims.
Muslims were blamed for starting the train fire, and Hindu mobs eager for revenge went on the rampage through Muslim neighbourhoods in towns and villages across Gujarat in three days of violence following the incident.
Responsibility for the train fire has been the subject of fierce dispute between Hindus and Muslims, but in March this year a court handed 11 death sentences and 20 life terms to Muslims convicted over the blaze.
Yesterday's verdicts on charges of murder and arson followed earlier convictions of other Hindu rioters over the violence.
The then government in the western state of Gujarat, headed by Hindu nationalist chief minister Narendra Modi, was accused by rights groups of tacitly supporting the rioters. Modi, seen as a future candidate for prime minister, denies all accusations.