This man, who was  spared of the gallows by the Special TADA Court here,  despite his active role in the 1993 Mumbai serial bombings, died in hospital just a  week later.

Ejaz Pathan, convicted for plotting and supplying men to carry out the deadliest terror attack, died at J J Hospital here on  Friday.

He was sentenced a week before by the TADA court to  10 years in jail. His death was confirmed by Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP)  Brijesh Singh.

He abetted blasts

Pathan had attended the very first conspiracy meeting at underworld don Dawood Ibrahim's residence in Dubai and actively participated in carrying out the plan by providing his men to Dawood's right hand man,  Tiger Memon, who executed the blasts, in which  257 citizens were killed.

Pathan fled to Dubai in 1993 after the blasts and later hid in Pakistan, along with Dawood and Tiger Memon. However, he reportedly fell out with Dawood, whose men made an attempt on his life in Karachi in 1998. During that attempt, Pathan sustained a bullet injury.

The gangster had no choice but to leave Pakistan and return to Dubai, which extradited him back to India in 2003. He was tried along with other accused and found guilty by the TADA  court.

However, the judge, Pramod Kode took a lenient view and awarded him only 10 years rigorous imprisonment to him, surprising many.

The judge held that there was no proof about Pathan's involvement in the later stages of the conspiracy. Pathan supplied men to Tiger basically to carry out landings of RDX explosives, hand grenades and AK-56 rifles at Shekhadi coast.

The Special Public Prosecutor, Ujjwal Nikam, did not hide his disappointment and stated that the CBI might appeal against the sentence in the Supreme Court, in view of the severity of Pathan's involvement.

The CBI, in fact, had sought death penalty to Pathan and Mr Nikam speculated that the judge might have handed a lighter punishment in view  of his ill health.

Pathan was suffering from various ailments such as diabetes, heart disease, blood clots in the brain and had also suffered a paralytic attack earlier.