Yakub to be hanged on his birthday

For the 12 serial bomb blasts that terrorized Mumbai and India 22 years ago, killing 257 and injuring 713, Yakub Memon, the lone condemned accused and younger brother of absconding mastermind Tiger Memon, will hang.

The execution will take place at 7am on July 30, which happens to be Yakub’s 54th birthday.

The Supreme Court on Tuesday closed the last possible window for relief by dismissing Yakub’s curative petition, which had sought reconsideration of the death sentence and imposition of life imprisonment. The President had rejected Yakub’s mercy petition in May last year.

Yakub on Tuesday evening filed a fresh mercy petition before the superintendent of Nagpur Central Jail, where he is lodged. It will now be forwarded to Governor Ch Vidyasagar Rao for consideration.

However, the state government confirmed that it would go ahead with the execution on July 30, the date set in the warrant issued by the Tada court in April this year.

“As per the order passed by the Tada court and confirmed by the SC, he (Yakub) will hang on July 30 at 7am. There is no change in plan,” principal secretary (prisons) Vijay Satbir Singh told TOI.

A bench of Chief Justice H L Dattu and Justices T S Thakur and A R Dave, the three senior-most judges in the SC, considered Yakub’s curative petition in chamber without the presence of lawyers and dismissed it on the ground that none of the grounds raised by him warranted the court to reconsider the view reached while dismissing his review petition.

A bench of Justices Dave, J Chelameswar and Kurian Joseph had on April 9 heard at length Yakub’s petition seeking review of the SC’s March 21, 2013 judgment upholding his death penalty but commuting the capital punishment of ten other convicts to life imprisonment.

The April 9 order said, “We have heard the learned senior counsel appearing for the review petitioner (Yakub) and the learned senior counsel appearing for the respondent (Maharashtra), at length. We have gone through the judgment sought to be reviewed and we have considered the arguments advanced on both sides. As requested, we have also gone through the judgment of the trial court, in order to appreciate the contention on conviction and sentence.”

“We find that all the arguments advanced by the review petitioner have been considered in detail in the judgment which is sought to be reviewed. Hence, we do not find any error apparent on the face of record or any other ground so as to warrant interference in exercise of our review jurisdiction. The review petition is hence dismissed.”

Against this order, Yakub had filed a curative petition, which was dismissed on Tuesday, clearing the way for his scheduled hanging.

Yakub’s journey on death row began on July 27, 2007, when Tada court judge P D Kode awarded the death penalty to him, but with a rider that it needed confirmation by the SC. The appeals were automatically admitted, and the hearing began in 2012.

After the demolition of the Babri Masjid in Ayodhya on December 6, 1992, communal violence broke out throughout the country. Mumbai witnessed rioting in two phases, in December 1992 and January 1993. To take revenge, Tiger Memon and gangster Dawood Ibrahim conspired to commit terrorist acts in Mumbai.

In pursuance to the conspiracy, Dawood agreed to send arms and ammunition from abroad. Tiger Memon and his men received the arms and ammunition sent by sea to Mumbai. In continuation of the conspiracy, Tiger sent some of the accused persons to Dubai and from there to Pakistan for training in handling arms and ammunition.

On March 12, 1993, in a span of about two hours, between 1.33pm to 3.40pm, a series of 12 explosions hit Bombay Stock Exchange, Katha Bazar, Sena Bhavan, Century Bazar, Mahim Causeway, Air India building, Zaveri Bazar, Hotel Sea Rock, Plaza Theatre, Juhu Centaur Hotel, Airport Bay-54 and Airport Centaur Hotel.

This was the first ever terrorist attack in the world where RDX (Research Department Explosive) was used on a large scale after World War II.