IM ‘terrorist’ not minor: AIIMS report

An AIIMS report told a Delhi court on Monday that an alleged Indian Mujahideen terrorist, who claimed to be a minor, was actually aged between 25-26 years.

An AIIMS report told a Delhi court on Monday that an alleged Indian Mujahideen terrorist, who claimed to be a minor, was actually aged between 25-26 years.

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The All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) was on March 15 directed to constitute a medical board to determine the age of Salman alias Chotu after his counsel claimed the accused was a minor at the time of the Delhi serial blasts.

K L Ansari and Iftikar Ansari, counsels for Salman, however, did not agree to the findings of the AIIMS report and contended that the accused was juvenile at the time of serial blasts in the capital on September 13, 2008 as shown in his class 10th mark sheet of Uttar Pradesh Board, which mentioned his date of birth as October 3, 1992.

Public Prosecutor Rajeev Mohan argued there were contradictory claims about the age of the accused as his class I certificate showed his date of birth as February 9, 1992 while the passport obtained from Nepal showed it to be May 27, 1985.

The Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Kaveri Baweja read out the report submitted by the AIIMS' medical board to the court and said that it mentioned the age as somewhere between 25 to 26.

The court kept the application of the accused claiming him to be a minor as pending and sent him to judicial custody till tomorrow. According to the police, they have recovered a Nepali passport obtained under a fake name and an international SIM card from Ahmed's possession.