Is Abu Salem's 25-year jail term over? Supreme Court to examine plea seeking his release

Gangster Abu Salem has moved the Supreme Court seeking release in the 1993 Bombay blast case claiming that he has already completed 25 years of imprisonment in accordance with the top court's 2022 ruling [Abu Salem Abdul Qayoom Ansari vs. State of Maharashtra & Ors.].

On January 12, A Bench of Justices Vikram Nath and Sandeep Mehta asked Salem to place on record the relevant Maharashtra prison rules on remission and posted the matter for further hearing on February 9.

The Court was hearing Salem’s challenge to a Bombay High Court order which had refused to grant him interim relief.

The High Court had issued notice on his petition but at the same time said that the plea raised “arguable questions” about whether he had completed 25 years in custody.

He then approached the apex court.

Salem’s core claim is that if three components are correctly counted together - his undertrial custody, his post-conviction custody, and the remission he has earned in jail for good conduct, he has crossed the 25-year mark by March 31, 2025. According to him, anything beyond that is illegal custody.

The dispute traces back to Salem’s extradition from Portugal. In December 2002, India gave an assurance to Portugal that if Salem was extradited, he would neither be given the death penalty nor be kept in prison for more than 25 years. After a long extradition battle, Salem was brought to India in 2005 and first produced before the designated TADA (Terrorist and Disruptive Activities (Prevention) Act) court in the 1993 Bombay blasts case on November 11, 2005.

He faced trial in two TADA cases, one relating to the 1993 Bombay blasts and another separate case. He was convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment by judgments dated February 25, 2015 and September 7, 2017 respectively.

While sentencing him in 2017, the TADA court granted him the benefit of set-off under Section 428 of the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC) for the period he had already spent in custody.

The TADA court also made it clear that Salem’s life sentences in both cases would run concurrently under Section 427(2) of the CrPC. It observed that since Salem had been arrested in 2005, he would in any case get the benefit of set-off for that entire period against whichever sentence was imposed.

Salem subsequently challenged his conviction and sentence before the Supreme Court. In July 2022, a Bench of Justices Sanjay Kishan Kaul and MM Sundresh held that in view of the extradition assurance, the Central government was bound to ensure that Salem is released after completion of 25 years.

The Court said that on Salem completing 25 years, the Central government must advise the President to exercise powers under Article 72 or itself use powers under Sections 432 and 433 of the CrPC within one month of completion of that period.

The Court, however, made it clear that it was not commuting Salem’s sentence, and that the period he spent in Portugal in a passport fraud case could not be counted towards the 25 years.

After this judgment, Salem began asserting that his 25-year period was nearing completion. In December 2024, a special TADA court rejected his plea seeking premature release.

He then approached the Bombay High Court in February 2025 seeking a writ directing the jail authorities to give him a release date.

While admitting his plea and noting that he had raised “arguable questions”, the High Court refused interim relief. Relying on the Supreme Court’s 2022 judgment, it recorded that Salem’s date of arrest was October 12, 2005 and said that, prima facie, 25 years had not yet been completed.

Salem now says this view ignores later orders of the TADA court. He relies heavily on a June 2024 order by the TADA court which reiterated that he must be given set-off as an undertrial in the Bombay blasts case from October 12, 2005 till September 7, 2017. This, according to him, makes his undertrial period 11 years, 9 months and 26 days.

He further says that his post-conviction custody from February 25, 2015 till April 30, 2025 comes to 10 years, 2 months and 4 days.

On top of this, even the jail certificate admits that he has earned 3 years, 2 months and 14 days of jail remission for good conduct.

Added together, Salem claims, this makes 25 years, 4 months and 14 days as on April 30, 2025.

Salem's plea further contends that prison authorities wrongly reduced his undertrial period by stopping it at 2015 instead of 2017, thereby shaving off more than two years from his calculation.

He has also relied on judgments of the Bombay High Court explaining that “earned remission” under jail rules is different from remission under Sections 432 and 433 of the CrPC, and that earned remission automatically adds to the term of imprisonment.

Salem has also pointed to contradictory stands taken by different authorities, some saying he will be considered only after 50 years, some saying after 25 years, and some saying his case has already been recommended, showing, according to him, complete administrative confusion.

During the January 12 hearing, the Supreme Court narrowed the immediate issue to one crucial question: what do the Maharashtra prison rules actually say about remission, especially for convicts under TADA.

That answer, the Bench indicated, will decide whether Salem’s claim of having crossed the 25-year line has any legal foundation.

The case will be heard next on February 9.

Salem was represented by Senior Advocate Rishi Malhotra.