24 February 2004	Tuesday	03 Muharram 1425

AHMEDABAD, Feb 23: A court ruled on Monday lie detector tests could not be forced on 12 men accused of gangrape and murder during the Gujarat massacres in 2002.

Last week detectives belonging to India's Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), applied for permission to conduct lie detector tests with S.N. Padhyay, who is heading a special court looking into the riot cases.

"The CBI's application was rejected," a court official said. "It fell because the accused were not willing to go through the scientific tests which included taking a lie detector test, undergoing narco-analysis tests and being part of an identification parade."

This will still allow federal detectives to run standard fingerprint and footprint tests but not much else, the official added. Last month, police arrested 12 people for the gangrape of three Muslim women and the killing of seven villagers. A leader of Gujarat's ruling Bharatiya Janata Party was among those arrested. -AFP