Mumbai: In a major judgment, a sessions court today (Jul 8, 2004) awarded life sentence to 11 convicts, including a Pakistani national, for triggering a chain of bomb blasts in local trains and railway stations in 1998 killing four people and injuring 30.

Besides life sentence, the accused were handed over various other sentences by the Additional Sessions Judge V L Achalya, who said all sentences should run consecutively and not concurrently.

The Judge also directed the State Government not to exercise its powers to condone or reduce the punishment.

Acquitting Pakistani national Shamshed Gulam Kadir Hyder, the court said he should be deported to Pakistan and Mumbai police has been asked to make necessary provision for his safe custody.

On June 29, the court had convicted the accused after finding them guilty of offences to destabilise the country by creating a series of explosions.

The convicts are Aftab Sayed Ahmed, Asgar Kadar Shaikh, Afzal Abdul Hamid, Iqbal Mohammed Hanif, Jaffar Abdul Shaikh, Kadir Mohammed Shafi, Shaikh Shahid Khalid Ansari, Shabir Bashir Chavan, Javed Gulam Hussain, Farooq Yusuf Shaikh and Mohammed Yakub Abdul Majeed.

Among them, Javed Gulam Hussain is a Pakistani national, police alleged.

The prosecutor Ujjwal Nikam had sought death penalty for Aftab Sayed Ahmed, Asgar Kadar Shaikh, Farooq Yusuf Shaikh and Javed Gulam Hussain. For the rest, he pleaded for life sentence.

According to prosecution, the accused had allegedly hatched a conspiracy in 1997-end at the behest of ISI (Inter-Services Intelligence) to create a chain of explosions at railway stations, platforms and railway tracks in and around Mumbai. In furtherance of the conspiracy, the accused carried out five explosions during January 1998 and February 1998 on central and Western railway routes.

The accused were charged with sections 302 IPC (murder) and 120-b IPC (conspiracy).

The blasts were carried out at Kanjurmarg station on the central railway, near Virar station, on railway tracks between Goregaon and Malad, near Santacruz railway station and on platform number two at Kandivali railway station on western railway route.