New Delhi: Two accused – Mohammed Rafiq Shah and Mohammed Hussain – of the 2005 Delhi serial blasts case were acquitted of all charges by Patiala House court on Thursday after spending 11 years in jail. The court, however, sentenced another accused Tariq Ahmed Dar to 10 years of imprisonment.
At least 62 people were killed and more than 200 injured in three powerful explosions in two busy markets – Sarojini Nagar and Paharganj – and in a bus in the Kalkaji area on October 29, 2005, two days before Diwali.
The prosecution built its case on the call intercepts and locations of the accused as key evidence. Additional Sessions Judge Reetesh Singh pronounced the judgement.
Dar, a Kashmiri and the alleged mastermind, was arrested in Dhaka by a special police branch and deported in 2007 in connection with the blasts and for his alleged links with the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT).
He was released three months later by the Tis Hazari Court after the Delhi Police failed to file a chargesheet against him due to lack of evidence.
Later, on the basis of his call details that allegedly proved he was in touch with LeT operatives, the Delhi Police chargesheeted him.
The court had framed charges against Dar for waging war against the state, conspiring, collecting arms, murder and attempt to murder.
The court, as reported, had earlier clubbed the three blasts cases for the recording of evidence but it framed the charges separately against the accused.
The first blast took place at around 5:25 pm on October 29, 2005 in Delhi’s Paharganj area when a bag containing explosives went off and killed 18. The explosion occured at 6 pm the same day in DTC’s Outer Mudrika bus near Kalkaji. After 5 minutes, the third blast took place in Delhi’s busy market Sarojini Nagar.
The Pakistan-based Islamist terrorist organisation, the Islamic Revolutionary Front or Islamic Inquilab Mahaz, claimed responsibility for the serial blasts.