A Delhi court on Tuesday gave life term to Shahzad Ahmad, lone convict and suspected Indian Mujahideen operative, in the 2008 Batla House shootout in which decorated police officer MC Sharma was killed and two other policemen were injured.
The court also imposed a fine of Rs 95,000 on Shahzad Ahmad. Of this, Rs 40,000 has to be paid to the family of the slain police officer and Rs 20,000 to injured Head Constable Balwant Singh.
Additional Sessions Judge Rajender Kumar Shastri said: “I find more mitigating circumstances than aggravating ones and hence the case in hand is not a ‘rarest of rare case’, which warrants death penalty for the convict. The convict Shahzad is thus sentenced to imprisonment for life and also a fine of Rs 95,000.”
However, the family of slain Delhi Police Inspector MC Sharma expressed shock over the judgement. His mother Devendri Devi said they were confident Shahzad would be given capital punishment.“We totally disagree with the court judgement. Shahzad does not deserve any leniency, he should be hanged,” she said.
The Delhi Police had sought death penalty for Shahzad on Monday on the grounds that he was a “habitual offender” and that there was no scope for his reformation or rehabilitation.
The judge in the order held that: “This convict (Shahzad) has not been found guilty, of any offence he has been charged with (involvement in serial bomb blasts in Delhi in September 2008) in the referred cases (by the prosecution). That an accused is assumed to be innocent till he is proved guilty is an oft-cited tenet of law.”
In the judgement, the ASJ also stressed on the significance of the police force in the country and referred to the murder of Inspector Sharma as a deep wound on law.
“Police is an integral part of our life as it ensures our safety day and night. Police have the responsibility of bringing perpetrators to the book. The law obliges every person to assist the police in apprehending suspects. There can be no deeper wound on the rule of law than to attack a police officer who is discharging his official duty,” the judge said while calling this an aggravating factor against Shahzad.
The judge also said: “The incident shocked the collective conscience of the nation that wept the death of the braveheart Inspector Sharma. This is another aggravating factor.”However, the judge accepted the defence counsel’s contention that the crime committed by the convict was in retaliation and at the spur of the moment.