HC verdict in Kasab case today

Judgment on state govts plea against the acquittal of two likely

The verdict will be pronounced by a devision bench, comprising Justice Ranjana Desai and Justice R V More, which was hearing the arguments of Kasab and the Maharashtra government on a day-to-day basis from October 19, 2010.

The matter came to the High Court after a special court sentenced Kasab to death on May 6, 2010. As per the criminal procedure code (CrPC), every death penalty awarded by sessions court has to be confirmed by the High Court. It was then that Kasab too filed his appeal against the death penalty.

The state government also challenged the acquittal of two suspected Indian operatives of Pakistani terror outfit Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT). Faheem Ansari and Sabauddin Ahmed, who are accused of helping LeT with preparing and providing maps of the targets in Mumbai,  had been acquitted by the trial court for want of evidence.

State’s special counsel Ujjwal Nikam, who had prosecuted Kasab in the trial court, termed the attack “an act of state-sponsored terrorism” executed by LeT with the aid of Pakistan’s security establishment.

The thrust of Nikam’s arguments was that the conspiracy was hatched in Pakistan with an intention to destabalise India,  terrorise its citizens, create financial losses and issue a warning to nations whose people were targeted in the attacks.

Kasab and his accomplices were instructed by LeT handlers on the phone to hold as many people hostage as possible to demand from the Indian government the liberation of Kashmir and creation of a separate state for Muslims, Nikam contended.

He argued that the trial court had erred in partially accepting the confession of Kasab made before a magistrate which should have been accepted in toto. Kasab’s act of retracting his confession was an “after-thought”  and “well-advised.”

In his appeal, Kasab made incredible claim that the police had staged a false encounter at Girgaum Chowpatty on November 26, 2008, to implicate him in the crime. He even denied killing  the state ATS chief Hemant Karkare, IPS officer Ashok Kamte and encounter specialist Vijay Salaskar during the attack.

Kasab’s lawyer Amin Solkar relied on the observation of trial court that bullets recovered from bodies of Karkare and Salaskar did not tally with weapons of Kasab and Ismael although bullets in Kamte’s body matched with Ismael’s rifle.

The HC twice viewed the CCTV footage showing Kasab and his companions in terror act at Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus (CST). Alleging that police had suppressed material evidence about CCTV footages to nail Kasab, Solkar said some cameras installed at CST station had captured two terrorists attacking people but only one footage was shown to the court while the rest was ‘suppressed for reasons best known to prosecution’.

Even this footage did not show the faces of Kasab and his partner clearly, Solkar argued.