A relative of a convict breaks down outside Ahmedabad court after the verdict was delivered in the Naroda Patia massacre case. (PTI)

Ahmedabad, Aug. 29: A BJP MLA who was promoted as minister in the Narendra Modi government after the 2002 riots was today found guilty in the Naroda Patia massacre that left 97 people dead.

Maya Kodnani, inducted as minister of state for woman and child development by Modi in 2007, is the first former minister to be found guilty in any case relating to the riots that killed at least 1,000 people from the minority community.

A known L.K. Advani loyalist who had been charged with instigating the mob and distributing weapons in possibly the biggest single pogrom of the riots, Kodnani broke down after additional principal judge Jyotsna Yagnik convicted her of murder and criminal conspiracy.

Thirty-one other accused, including Bajrang Dal leader Babu Bajrangi, who has since left the group, were found guilty in the massacre of February 28, 2002, that took place during the three-day bandh called by the VHP and supported by the BJP against the Godhra train carnage.

The quantum of punishment will be announced on August 31.

Crying inconsolably, the three-time Naroda MLA, who was identified in court by 11 survivors as the mob leader, said she was a “victim of political conspiracy”.

Gujarat government spokesperson Jaynarayan Vyas said: “Let me be very clear that the MLA is not a state government functionary as you are trying to make it out. Secondly, Dr Maya Kodnani was not a minister when this incident took place.”

Lashing out at the Opposition, he said: “They have a different yardstick for BJP, for Mr Modi there is another yardstick, and for Gujarat it is yet another one... they have their eyes on the Assembly polls.”

The spokesperson glossed over the fact that Kodnani was promoted as minister by Modi although her name figured in several police complaints filed immediately after the riots. She stepped down only after the Special Investigating Team probing the case named her an “absconder” in 2009 — the minister had gone into hiding for two weeks before she surrendered and was arrested.

Before the SIT took over the probe from Gujarat police in 2008 on the Supreme Court’s orders, no action was taken against the BJP leader.

Kodnani, a gynaecologist who was behind bars for two months before she got bail, had all along denied she was present at the spot and claimed she was in Sola Civil hospital during the killing spree. However, cell phone records obtained by IPS officer Rahul Sharma, who was the DCP control room, helped the SIT nail Kodnani.

Union law minister Salman Khurshid said in Delhi today the judgment enhances the faith of the people in the legal system.

During arguments on the quantum of sentence today, special public prosecutor Akhil Desai sought death for all the convicts or at least 20 years in jail.

Defence advocate Niranjan Tikani appealed for leniency, asking the court to take into account the family background and financial condition of the convicts.

Tikani opposed death for Kodnani on the ground that her husband had been operated upon recently and was not keeping good health while her son was studying in the US.

No survivors — 33 people were injured in the Naroda Patia massacre — or witnesses were present in court when the verdict was delivered.

Babu Bajrangi, who had once boasted to an undercover reporter during a sting operation that he had felt like “Maharana Pratap”, looked composed and refused to talk to the media.

The court acquitted 29 accused. Among them were sisters Geeta Rathod and Ramila Rathod, who like Kodnani, had been arrested in 2009 and granted bail after two months. Their father Ratilala Rathod alias Jai Bhavani, an accused who was described as the “butcher” of Naroda Patia and against whom there was a charge of rape during the riots, had died in mysterious circumstances before the SIT took over the investigation. A fourth member of the family, their brother and advocate Mukesh Rathod, has been convicted.

The trial in the case — one of nine Gujarat riot cases being probed by the SIT — had started in August 2009.