A North 24 Parganas Fast Track Court on Saturday awarded death sentence to three lashkar-e-Taiba terrorists on charges of conspiring against sedition and conspiring to destabilise India. Out of three terrorists two are from Pakistan while one is from Jammu & Kashmir. “They have been awarded death sentence for waging war against nation” the prosecution lawyer said.
A Fast Track Court at Bongaon sub-division gave death sentence to leT operatives Muhammad Younis and Abdullah Khan, both from Pakistan. The third terrorist Muzaffar Ahmed however hails from Jammu & Kashmir in India. The fourth terrorist Sheikh Nasim alias Samir who was also arrested earlier was however absconding. He hailed from Aurangabad and managed to escape in 2013 from CID custody while on transit to Maharashtra, his home State.
The terrorists were arrested on April 1, 2007 by the Border Security Force when they were trying to cross over to India through Petrapol border with fake passports. Subsequent investigations revealed that the foursome had plans to carry out subversive activities in India particularly at some Army location in Kashmir, sources said.
After sustained interrogation the terrorists led State CID which was investigating the case to certain location in Kolkata from where huge quantity of ammonium nitrate was recovered. It was revealed that the chemicals were stored to carry out explosions at various places.
Out of the four terrorists Muhammad Younis and Abdullah Khan were suicide bombers, investigators said adding the other two terrorists had crossed over to Dhaka in Bangladesh from where they prepared fake documents and tried to cross over to India through Petrapol.
Though the police seized mobile phones from them SIM cards in these phones were missing. They had destroyed the SIM cards the police said.
The fourth terrorist Sheikh Naeem had reportedly confessed to the police before escaping that he was also involved in the Ghatkopar train blasts in Mumbai, sources said.
“Though the prosecution had failed to place enough evidence against my clients the court found them guilty and sentenced them to death” the lawyer said adding the guilty would appeal to the High Court.