A day after the prosecution rooted for a capital punishment to him in the 1993 Mumbai serial blasts case, notorious smuggler and key convict Mustafa Dossa, alias Mustafa Majnu, died of a massive heart attack at the State-run JJ Hospital on Wednesday afternoon.
Dossa (61), whom the TADA court had on June 16 convicted for being part of the 1993 blasts conspiracy and for overseeing the landing of anding of RDX and Kalashnikov assault rifles, was rushed from the Arthur Road prison to the jail ward of JJ Hospital at 3.30 am, following high-fever, hyper-tension and uncontrolled diabetes.
“Mustafa Dossa died of heart attack at 2.30 pm,” Dr TP lahane, the Dean of Sir JJ Group of Hospitals, said.
Dossa, who had undergone a by-pass surgery last year, is survived by his brother Mohammed Dossa, an absconding co-accused in the 1993 serial blasts case, his second wife and four children.
On Tuesday, in his submission made before the Special CBI court hearing the part-two trial of the 1993 Mumbai serial blasts, Special CBI counsel Deepak Salvi had dubbed Dossa as one of the “brains” behind the conspiracy to engineer serial blasts at 13 locations across Mumbai on March 12, 1993, in which 257 persons were killed and 713 others injured.
Dossa, who was deported from UAE on March 20, 2003, is the younger brother of Mohammed Dossa, the absconding chief landing agent of Dawood. It was he who had asked his brother to have explosives landed in India for the blast. He was present at the first conspiracy meeting held at his residence in Dubai and supervised landing of Kalashnikovs and RDX twice in the Raigad coast in Maharashtra. At the Dubai meeting, Dawood, Tiger, Annes Ibrahim, Mohammed Dossa, Mustafa Dossa and Ejaz Khan were present.
On his role in the 1993 serial blasts, Special Public Prosecutor Salvi argued before the CBI court on Tuesday: “His degree of responsibility towards the commission of the crime was the highest. If not for him and the other absconders, the crime would never have taken place”.
Alluding to the Supreme Court’s decision on confirming the death penalty of key 1993 serial blasts accused Yakub Memon, Salvi said: “Just like the Supreme Court had held that Yakub Memon’s deeds cannot be viewed distinct from the act of Tiger Memon (an absconding accused in the blasts case), the same can be attributed to Dossa and other suggestion would be futile and worth discarding at the first glance”.
“Having demonstrated that accused Mustafa Dossa had played a role which is still severe than Yakub Memon, we seek the capital punishment for him,” Salvi told the court.
A resident of downtown Agripada in south Mumbai, Dossa had led a colourful and violent life. With a string of romantic liaisons, Dossa at one stage earned the sobriquet of Majnu.