1993 train blasts case: CBI to challenge Abdul Karim Tunda's acquittal

The CBI will challenge before the Supreme Court the acquittal of Abdul Karim Tunda in the 1993 serial train blasts case by a special court in Ajmer, officials said Friday, 1 March.

The agency said 12 people have been convicted in the case so far, including Irfan Khan and Hamir-Ul-Uddin, who were sentenced to life imprisonment on Thursday by judge Mahaveer Prasad Gupta of the Terrorist and Disruptive Activities (Prevention) Act (TADA) court, who also acquitted Tunda.

The agency officials said they are studying the judgment and an appeal would soon be filed in the Supreme Court.

A series of explosions rocked six long-distance trains, including the Rajdhani Express in Lucknow, Kanpur, Hyderabad, Surat and Mumbai on the intervening night of 5-6 December 1993. Two people were killed and 22 injured in the blasts.

The cases were handed over to the CBI, which had registered five separate FIRs in the matter.

"The investigation disclosed that the various accused persons entered into a criminal conspiracy with the object to over-awe the government established by law, spreading terror in public at large and to create disharmony among different communities of the country by committing terrorist acts, like bomb explosions in the running prestigious trains in different parts of the country, on the occasion of first anniversary of the demolition of a structure at Ayodhya," a CBI spokesperson said in a statement on Friday.

The agency had filed charge sheets against 21 accused, of which 15 were awarded life sentences 20 years ago on 28 February 2004 by a TADA court in Ajmer. The Supreme Court had upheld the sentence of 10 of these convicts.

The 81-year-old Tunda, a close aide of wanted terrorist Dawood Ibrahim, was one of those accused of carrying out the blasts to mark the first anniversary of the Babri Masjid demolition. He was arrested in 2013 from a hamlet near the India-Nepal border.

"On 29 February 2024, the TADA Court, Ajmer pronounced the judgment vide which the trial court sentenced accused persons namely Hameer-UL-Uddin and Irfan Ahmed to life imprisonment and acquitted one accused (Tunda)," the CBI spokesperson said.