Arrests, Convictions and Verdict
Many hundreds of people were arrested and detained in Indian courts. In 2006, 100 of the 129 finally accused were found to be guilty and were convicted by Justice PD Kode of the specially designated TADA court. Many of the 100 are still missing including the main conspirators and masterminds of the attacks – Tiger Memon and Dawood Ibrahim. On 12 September 2006, the special TADA court hearing the case convicted four members of the Memon family for their involvement in the 1993 Bombay bombings.
Three other members of the Memon family were acquitted by the special TADA court with the judge giving them the benefit of the doubt. The four members of the Memon family are being held after being found guilty on charges of conspiring and abetting acts of terror. All four of them face jail terms from five years in prison to life imprisonment, that will be determined based on the severity of their crime. A day later, the TADA court announced that it would start pronouncing the verdict of the thirty-one people charged with transporting and planting bombs.
Yakub Memon, the brother of prime accused Tiger Memon, was charged for possession of unauthorised arms. After the blasts, family members of Tiger, including Yakub, escaped from Bombay to Dubai and Pakistan. Correspondents say Tiger Memon owned a restaurant in Bombay and was allegedly closely associated with Dawood Ibrahim, the chief suspect.
Except for Tiger and his brother Ayub, the entire family returned to India and were prompty arrested by the Central Bureau of Investigation in 1994. Since then, Yakub has been in custody and is undergoing treatment for depression. The Memon family was subsequently tried in court and found guilty of conspiracy. The defence lawyers have asked for leniency in the sentencing and have caused delays in the process.
Two of the accused, Mohammed Umar Khatlab and Badshah Khan (pseudonym given by the prosecution to hide his real identity) turned state approvers.
Dawood Ibrahim, believed to have masterminded the terrorist attacks, is the Don of the Mumbai organised crime syndicate D-Company, largely consisting of Muslims. He is suspected of having connections to several Pakistan based terrorist groups, such as al-Qaeda and its leader, Osama bin Laden, as well as Lashkar-e-Toiba and was declared a terrorist by the governments of India and the United States in 2003. Ibrahim is now wanted by Interpol as a part of the worldwide terror syndicate of Osama bin Laden. He has been in hiding since the blasts and is believed to be hiding in Pakistan, which the Pakistani government denies. The Bush administration in the United States imposed sanctions on Ibrahim in 2006.
The penalty stage of the longest running trial in India's history is still ongoing. In February 2007, prosecutors asked for the death penalty for forty-four of the hundred convicted. The prosecution also requested the death penalty for those convicted of conspiracy in the case.
Read more about this topic: 1993 Bombay Bombings
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