Allowing them to remain in society dangerous: court on Ahmedabad blast convicts

In the 7,015-page judgement made public on Saturday, additional sessions judge AR Patel observed that “death sentence is the only and ultimate punishment for such terror-minded accused so as to ensure the country’s safety, peace and security” (sic).

The court identified 31 of those awarded death sentence to be the “key conspirators” and seven others as “active co-conspirators” behind the act of terror.

The order reads further, “Government and private properties worth crores of rupees were damaged. The event created terror and fear in the minds of people in Ahmedabad, Surat and all over Gujarat. They not only harbored anti-national sentiments but also committed such acts. These accused have no respect for a constitutionally elected government.”

‘Established IM to carry on with terror activities’

The verdict notes that those sentenced to death were “affiliated to prohibited organisation SIMI and after the organisation was outlawed they established the Indian Mujahideen (IM) to carry on with terror activities.

“To take revenge of the 2002 post-Godhra riots, they falsely believed that the Narendra Modi-led Gujarat government was an anti-Muslim. They hatched a conspiracy to bomb “areas with higher Hindu population to conduct mass killings of them to take revenge for the 2002 riots. The areas such as Odhav, Maninagar, Bapunagar, Naroda, Isanpur, Shahibaug with higher Hindu population were chosen,” the court observed.

Of the 240 injured in the blasts, 231 were Hindu and nine were Muslims, the verdict notes.

Many of the accused, aged between 21 and 40, already had several cases pending against them, the judge noted. “It is clear that they have a criminal bent of mind,” he added.

Also, to ensure that the victims’ families continue to trust the criminal justice system, it is important to pay the victims from the fines imposed on the convicts, he said.

Interestingly, several investigators who were cross-examined denied having looked into links of the accused to other blasts across the country, and the court relied heavily on the criminal antecedents of the accused noting that there were multiple offences against them across cities in the country from which one can say that they were accustomed to committing crimes and there was no hope of their reformation.

The investigators in the case admitted to have recovered no explosive or weapons from the accused at the time of their arrest, which the judge said was due to their late arrests.