Mumbai blasts case: Death for 2, Abu Salem gets life imprisonment

MUMBAI: Extradited gangster Abu Salem was on Thursday sentenced to life imprisonment even as two of his co-conspirators, Tahir Merchant and Firoz Abdul Rashid Khan, were awarded the death penalty for their role in carrying out the 1993 Mumbai serial bomb blasts.

Abu Salem is surrounded by policemen as he arrives at a court in Hyderabad. Reuters file

Shiv Kumar

Tribune News Service

Mumbai - September 7

Extradited gangster Abu Salem was on Thursday sentenced to life imprisonment even as two of his co-conspirators, Tahir Merchant and Firoz Abdul Rashid Khan, were awarded the death penalty for their role in carrying out the 1993 Mumbai serial bomb blasts.

A fourth convict, Karimullah Khan, has been awarded a life sentence while a fifth, Riyaz Siddiqui, was sentenced to ten years imprisonment.

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Mustafa Dossa, who along with Salem, was one of the masterminds of the blasts, died of a heart attack in jail on June 28 shortly after being found guilty.

The blasts on March 13, 1993, left 257 people dead across Mumbai.

Judge GA Sanap of the special Terrorism and Disruptive Activities Act (TADA) court announced the sentences today after the prosecution had asked the court to award a life sentence for Salem.

Abu Salem was extradited from Portugal in 2005 after the Indian government gave an undertaking to that country that he would not be awarded the death penalty if he was found guilty.

Gangsters Dawood Ibrahim and Tiger Memon, who were found guilty of masterminding the 1993 bomb blasts, are believed to be hiding in Pakistan while Yakub Memon who was nabbed by Indian agencies in Nepal was hanged for his role in the blasts.

The trials of Salem and other conspirators were separated from the others as they had been arrested much later.

April 19, 1995: First leg of trial commences

Sept 18, 2002: Abu Salem detained in Lisbon, Portugal

March 20, 2003: Accused Mustafa Dossa arrested by CBI at IGI Airport, New Delhi, on his arrival from Dubai

Sept 2003: Main trial ends. TADA court in Mumbai reserves judgment

Jan 9, 2004: Charges framed against Dossa

Nov 11, 2005: Salem extradited to India

Dec 9, 2005: Charges framed against Salem

June 13, 2006: Abu Salem’s trial separated

Sept 12, 2006: TADA court judge PD Kode starts delivering the judgment, pronounces four members of the Memon family guilty, and acquits three. Later, 12 convicts were awarded death penalty while 20 were given life sentence. Other convicts were handed over different sentences

Feb 2007: Main trial concludes. Second leg involving seven accused begins

Mar 16, 2013: Sanjay Dutt surrenders before court after SC upholds conviction

March 21, 2013: Supreme Court upholds death sentence of convict Yakub Memon, brother of Tiger Memon, and commutes death sentence of 10 convicts to life term. Life imprisonment of 16 out of 18 convicts also upheld

August 13, 2013: TADA court drops certain charges againt Salem which violated the extradition treaty with Portugal

July 30, 2015: Key conspirator and lone death row convict in the case, Yakub Memon, hanged.

Dec 7, 2015: Final arguments of the second phase of the trial start

June 8, 2016: Court rejects plea of accused Firoz Abdul Rashid in which he said he wanted to become an approver

March 2017: Trial concludes

June 16, 2017: TADA court judge GA Sanap convicts six accused, including Dossa and Salem, and acquits one

June 28, 2017: Dossa dies of cardiac arrest in Mumbai hospital

Sept 7, 2017: Court awards death sentence to Tahir Merchant and Firoz Abdul Rashid Khan, life imprisonment to Abu Salem and Karimullah Khan and 10 years’ imprisonment to Riyaz Siddiqui. PTI inputs