Fehmida Sayed, 45, broke down after the verdict was announced. A mother of three, she expected to be spared on account of being a woman, she told her lawyers.
But making no such distinction, special Pota judge MR Puranik sentenced Fehmida, her husband Hanif, 47, and their associate Ashrat Ansari, 33, to death on three counts — hatching the conspiracy leading to the blasts at Gateway of India and Zaveri Bazaar on August 25, 2003, and in a BEST bus at Ghatkopar on July 28, 2003.
While 54 people died in the Gateway and Zaveri Bazaar blasts, two were killed at Ghatkopar.
At noon on Thursday, the three convicts, held guilty by the court on July 27, were made to stand near the dock. Fehmida, clad in a burkha, was wringing her hands. Hanif, wearing a white kurta-pyjama, and Ansari, sporting jeans and a white shirt, looked nervously at the judge.
“Each [convict] be hanged by neck till they are dead,” special judge Puranik announced.
In what could be one of the harshest punishments, the judge held that the substantive sentences should run consecutively (feasible only on paper though). Each of them has been handed 51 years in prison, four life terms and three death sentences.
The court has submitted the case to the Bombay high court for confirmation of the death sentences.
The court treated Fehmida as a conspirator on par with the two men, and has awarded her the same sentence.
“We are happy that all three got the death penalty. It is a message to people who indulge in terrorism that the law will not spare them if they commit such barbarous acts,” said special public prosecutor Ujjwal Nikam after the judgment.
After the sentence was pronounced, a frustrated Ansari shook hands with investigating officers in the case, including chief investigating officer Suresh Walishetty, wishing them “best of luck”.
Outside the court, he vented his frustration, saying: “This is a wrong judgment. The state is prejudiced against us. Koi kayda nahi andhe logon ke saamne.”
Fehmida came out and started weeping. She was comforted by husband Hanif and lawyer Maharukh Adenwala. Her mother and son, too, were at the court.
On August 25, 2003, the couple had travelled in a taxi from Andheri to Gateway of India along with one of their minor daughters. She was arrested, but later discharged. They left a bag with a bomb in the boot of the taxi, according to the prosecution.
In the 382-page judgment, the court has stated that their confessions have been “well-corroborated” by the “un-shattered” testimony of the taxi driver, Shiv Narayan Pandey.
Pandey had stepped out of the taxi minutes before the blast at Gateway. The court also held that the testimony of the accused-turned-approver is “natural and reliable”.
