A special Prevention of Terrorism Act court on Thursday sentenced to death all the three persons convicted in the bomb blasts case of 2003. The explosions claimed 54 lives and injured 244 people.
The case comprises blasts at the Gateway of India and Zaveri Bazaar on August 25, 2003, the blast aboard a bus at Ghatkopar on July 28, 2003 and the planting of a bomb in a bus in the Santa Cruz Electronics Export Processing Zone on December 2, 2002, which, however, did not explode.
Judge M.R. Puranik, after pronouncing the sentence against Haneef Sayyed, his wife Fahmeeda and Ashrat Ansari, said they “shall be hanged by the neck till they are dead.”
They were sentenced under three Sections: 120B of the Indian Penal code (IPC) for hatching a criminal conspiracy to cause bomb blasts, 120B read with Section 302 (punishment for murder) of the IPC, and 120B read with 3 (2) (a) of the POTA, stipulating the punishment for a terror act.