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2006 Mumbai blasts accused sentenced to death by Bengal court
Sheikh Abdullah Nayeem alias Sameer, a resident of Aurangabad, Maharashtra, was sentenced to death by the fast track court at Bongaon in Bengal’s North 24 Parganas district on Saturday.
Lashkar-e-Taiba militant Sheikh Abdullah Nayeem alias Sameer, a resident of Aurangabad, Maharashtra, was sentenced to death by the fast track court at Bongaon in Bengal’s North 24 Parganas district on Saturday morning for his role in the Mumbai train blasts in 2006 and attacks on Indian army camps in Kashmir.
Nayeem, an engineer by profession, fled from custody in 2013 while he was being tried. He was caught again last month.
Nayeem and three of his associates, Mohammed Younis and Mohammed Abdullah, both residents of Karachi, Pakistan, and Mohammed Muzaffar Ahmed, a resident of Anantnag in Kashmir, were arrested by Border Security Force (BSF) near the India-Bangladesh border in Bongaon on April 4, 2017 while trying to sneak into India.
Nayeem escaped from police custody in 2013 when he was being taken to Maharashtra for interrogation in connection with the train blasts. The other three were sentenced to death by the fast track court in Bongaon in January 2017.
According to Nishad Parvez, DIG, CID (operations), the LeT men were charged under section 120B (criminal conspiracy), 121 (waging, or attempting to wage war) and 122 (collecting arms with intention to wage war against the state) of the IPC, among other sections.
On October 10 this year, National Investigation Agency (NIA) nabbed Nayeem and his trial started again. He was additionally charged with taking part in a conspiracy to assassinate senior politicians including the Prime Minister.
On Saturday, he was sentenced to death by the Bongaon court.
Nayeem, who speaks fluent English, had to plead his own case at the Bongaon fast track court as no lawyer was ready to represent him in the fresh trial.
A CID officer, who did not wish to be named, said the LeT militants admitted during interrogation that they planned attacks on army camps in Kashmir.
Fake voter ID cards, mobile SIM cards, Indian maps and Indian currency were seized from their possession.
