Spell out stand on Abu Salem's jail term, SC tells Centre

New Delhi, March 8

The Supreme Court on Tuesday asked the Centre to spell out if it stood by the solemn assurance given by then Deputy Prime Minister LK Advani to the Portuguese authorities not to award a prison term exceeding 25 years to gangster Abu Salem while extraditing him to India.

Dissatisfied with the CBI’s stand on the matter, a Bench led by Justice Sanjay Kishan Kaul asked the Union Home Secretary to file an affidavit in three weeks, clarifying the government’s stand on the solemn assurance given by then Deputy PM to Portugal and posted the matter for further hearing on April 12.

“Who has asked you to file an affidavit? The CBI is just a prosecuting agency. We have asked you to inform us whether you are going to abide by the assurance given. Is the government saying that it will not stand by the international commitment?” the Bench told Additional Solicitor General KM Nataraj who represented the CBI.

The CBI said the assurance given by India to Portugal on the maximum sentence at the time of extradition of Salem wasn’t binding on the Indian courts. However, the Bench noted that the Centre’s stand on the commitment made by it would have wide ramifications for future extraditions. “The government has to take a stand keeping in mind the international commitment,” it said.

Extradited from Portugal on November 11, 2005, Salem was sentenced to life imprisonment by a TADA court in 2017 in the 1993 Mumbai blasts case. In 2002, the Government of India had given an assurance to the Portuguese government that Salem would neither be given death penalty nor awarded imprisonment exceeding 25 years, Salem has contended.