1. This petition under Article 226 and 227 of the Constitution of India is preferred by the petitioner/original accused with following prayers:

14(i) That the Hon'ble Court may be pleased to issue a Writ of Certiorari and/or any other appropriate writ whereby the order of the learned Addl. Sessions Judge rejecting the application Exh. 1010 in Sessions Case Nos. 69 to 86 of 2009 is set aside and quashed dated 17.2.2010.

(ii) That the Hon'ble Court may be pleased to prevent the prosecution from adducing evidence of Police Officers who have purportedly recorded the confessional statements of the accused under section 32 of the POTA Act;

(iii) That the Hon'ble Court may be pleased to prevent the prosecution from producing the Sanction Orders as per the provisions of Section 50 of the POTA Act during the pendency of trial of the accused under the Offences other than POTA Act;

(iv) That the Hon'ble Court may be pleased to stay the operation of the order on Exh. 1010 during pendency of the petitioner.

2. By the above order dated 17.2.2010 passed below application Exh. 1010 in Sessions Case No.69 of 2009 to 86 of 2009 and 204 of 2009 by learned Additional Sessions Judge, Panchmahal, Camp at Ahmedabad, prayer of the accused-petitioner to restrain the prosecution from producing any kind of evidence relating to the Prevention of Terrorism Act, 2002 (for short POTA ) and another prayer to return the sanctioned orders passed by the competent authority of the Central Government under the POTA, came to be rejected.

3. So far as facts recorded in para 3 of the above impugned order by learned Additional Sessions Judge are not in dispute as such and accepted as they are by learned counsels appearing for the parties respectively. However, learned trial judge has succinctly summarized the facts of the case and main contentions with regard to two relief clauses along with reasons for the conclusion drawn for rejecting prayers of the accused-petitioner and for the sake of convenience the order impugned dated 17.2.2010 is produced herein below:-

1. Heard Ld. Advocate Mr. A.D. Shah, and Mr. A.A. Hasan appearing for the accused persons, and Ld. Special Public Prosecutor Mr. J.M.Panchal for the State. Read this application and relevant papers on record.

2. The present application has been submitted by the accused persons on 2-2-2010 praying relief as under:

The prosecution be restrained from producing any kind of evidence relating to the POTA.

Return the Sanction Orders passed by the Government under the POTA to the prosecution.

3. Having gone through the record, it appears that the following facts are not in much dispute:

On 27-2-2002, the incident of alleged attack on Sabarmati Express Train took place at Godhra Railway Station.

FIR being No.CR.I-09/2002 came to be lodged with Railway Police Station for the offences under sections 143, 147, 148, 149, 337, 338, 438, 302, 307, 120-B and 153A of the IPC, Sections 141, 150 and 152 of the Indian Railways Act, Sections 3 and 4 of the Prevention of Damages to Public Property Act and Section 135 of the Bombay Police Act.

On 2-3-2002, the I.O. submitted a Report requesting the Court to add the provisions of the POTA.

On 5-3-2002, the I.O. Mr. K.C. Bawa in his affidavit in Misc. Cri. Application No.606/2003 declared that there is no sufficient evidence and materials to attract the provisions of the POTA.

On 25-3-2002, the I.O. made an application for dropping of the said provisions of POTA.

On 22-5-2002, the first Charge sheet came to be filed for the offences punishable under the IPC and others.

On 29-9-2002, after nearly four months, supplementary Charge sheet was submitted for the offences under the POTA and others, making mention of conspiracy hatched on the night previous to the date of incident.

During the course of investigation, the confessional statements of the accused were recorded before the Magistrate under Section 164 of the IPC and by the competent Police officers under Section 32 of the POTA.

On 19-