The Gujarat High Court will pronounce its verdict in the 2002 Godhra train burning case on October 9. On February 27, 2002, 59 people including 27 women and 10 children were charred to death inside the Sabarmati Express train at the Godhra railway station in Gujarat. The victims included pilgrims who were coming back from Ayodhya. In the year 2011, a special court had convicted 31 accused and acquitted 63 others, saying the incident was a planned conspiracy. The accused were convicted under the murder and conspiracy provisions of Sections 302 and 120B of the IPC respectively and some sections of the Railway Act and Police Act.

The government will launch the next tranche of sovereign gold bond scheme, the second in 2017-18, on October 9 to cash in on the festive fever. The bonds will be sold through banks, Stock Holding Corporation of India, designated post offices and recognised stock exchanges namely the NSE and BSE. The sovereign gold bond scheme was launched in November 2015 with an objective to reduce the demand for physical gold and shift a part of the domestic savings, used for purchase of gold, into financial savings.

The All India Motor Transport Congress has called for a two-day token ‘chakka jam’, motor strike, on October 9 and 10 in protest against what the Congress described as “disruptive” Goods and Services Tax (GST) and new policies in the transport sector. A statement issued by AIMTC, which claims to represent 93 lakh truckers and approximately 50 lakh bus and passenger vehicle operators in the country, claimed that there was “utter confusion, chaos and disruption” due to the various policies in the transport sector and the new tax regime introduced by the Centre.

Rohingya militants whose attacks triggered an army crackdown in Myanmar's Rakhine state unleashing a huge wave of refugees has said their one-month ceasefire would end on October 9, but added they were open to peace if the government reciprocated. In a statement released through its Twitter account, the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) said its unilateral truce would end at midnight on October 9. "The humanitarian pause was conducted in order to enable humanitarian actors to assess and respond to the humanitarian crisis in Arakan (Rakhine)," the statement said.

The Madras High Court has adjourned to October 9 the hearing on individual writ petitions filed by 18 disqualified AIADMK MLAs owing allegiance to sidelined leader T.T.V. Dhinakaran. The petitioners had challenged an order passed by the Speaker of the Legislative Assembly on September 18 disqualifying them under the Tamil Nadu Legislative Assembly (Disqualification on Ground of Defection) Rules of 1986. Justice K. Ravichandrabaabu adjourned the cases after hearing at length arguments advanced by Senior Counsel Abishek Manu Singhvi, representing the petitioners, for nearly three hours.

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