Tortured confessions; true threat still at large: Why Bombay High Court acquitted all in 7/11 Mumbai blasts

The Bombay High Court on Monday acquitted all 12 men convicted in the 2006 Mumbai train blasts case. The High Court set aside the 2015 verdict delivered by the Special MCOCA Court, which had sentenced five of the accused to death and the remaining seven to life imprisonment. [The State of Maharashtra v. Kamal Ahmed Mohd. Vakil Ansari and Ors]..The serial blasts, which occurred on July 11, 2006 in first-class compartments of seven local trains between 6:23 pm and 6:29 pm, resulted in 187 deaths and injured more than 800 people. The Court described the investigation and trial process as fraught with serious irregularities and observed that the prosecution’s case gave the public a “misleading sense of resolution” while “the true threat remains at large.”"Punishing the actual perpetrator of a crime is a concrete and essential step toward curbing criminal activities, upholding the rule of law, and ensuring the safety and security of citizens. But creating a false appearance of having solved a case by presenting that the accused have been brought to justice gives a misleading sense of resolution. This deceptive closure undermines public trust and falsely reassures society, while in reality, the true threat remains at large," the Court said.A Bench of Justices Anil Kilor and Shyam Chandak cited several key reasons for overturning the convictions. These include procedural lapses, unreliable witness testimonies, torture-tainted confessions and mishandling of forensic evidence..Below are the five key reasons why the High Court set aside the convictions:.1. Delayed and weak eyewitness testimoniesThe Court found that most eyewitness testimonies were recorded over 100 days after the blasts, while the test identification parades (TIP) were delayed by nearly four months. Such a delay, according to the bench, undermined the reliability of the identifications made.Referring specifically to the testimony of two taxi drivers who allegedly dropped the accused at Churchgate Station, the Court opined that their ability to remember the faces of passengers after such a long gap, was doubtful.“In absence of test identification parades, the dock identification of the accused is after more than four years. Therefore, we examined whether there was any special reason to trigger the memory and recollect the face and description of the accused to enable the witnesses to identify them after such a long gap. Thereupon, we observed that both the witnesses could not get sufficient opportunity to interact, to observe and to store the face of the accused in memory. Hence, we held that their evidence is not safe to base conviction,” the Court held.One witness who claimed to have seen the bombs being assembled was found unreliable under cross-examination. Another witness was held unreliable as he had acted as a panch witness in multiple unrelated cases.“In light of the above referred law and considering the fact brought on record that PW-74 acted as a panch witness in many cases, it appears that he is a stock witness, and therefore, on this count also, his evidence creates doubt about the truthfulness of his evidence,” the Court observed..2. Key prosecution witnesses not calledThe Court criticised the prosecution for failing to call several important witnesses. Among them was an injured train commuter who had assisted the police in sketching the suspects within days of the blasts. He was neither brought for a TIP nor called to identify the accused in court. The Court noted that five other injured passengers and a shopkeeper who allegedly sold pressure cookers to the accused were also not examined.“Therefore, we are of the opinion that an adverse inference needs to be drawn against the prosecution for not examining the material and important witnesses,” the judgment stated..Deceptive closure undermines public trust and falsely reassures society, while in reality, the true threat remains at large.Bombay High Court.3. TIPs conducted by unauthorized officerThe Court found that the Test Identification Parades (TIPs) conducted to identify the accused involved in the crime were not procedurally sound. They were conducted on November 7, 2006, by SEO Barve, whose appointment as a Special Executive Officer had expired on May 7, 2005, and was only renewed on November 15, 2006.Given that Barve had no legal authority at the time of conducting the TIPs, the Court ruled the identification of accused through these parades inadmissible. .4. Confessional Statements tainted by tortureThe confessional statements extracted from 11 of the accused, which formed the core of the prosecution's evidence, were discredited by the Court due to evidences of custodial torture. The Court found that multiple confessions contained identical wording and listed names of co-accused in the same sequence, raising serious doubts about their authenticity.“It is beyond the realm of reasonable imagination that the sequence of names mentioned in two separate confessional statements would be exactly the same. While it is possible that the names of co-accused individuals may appear in multiple confessions, the precise order in which these names are listed should naturally vary from one statement to another,” the Court noted..Medical evidence from KEM and Bhabha hospitals was cited by the Court to support claims of physical abuse in custody. The accused alleged they were subjected to beatings, hung upside down, stripped, starved, sleep-deprived and injected with chemicals.The Court called this treatment “barbaric and inhuman.” In one case, an investigating officer allegedly told accused Kamal Ansari:“I agree that you don’t know anything, you are innocent, but have you not heard the saying "A frustrated cat scratches the pole and you are the pole and I am the cat. I have not got anything, I am scratching you'.”.7/11 Mumbai train blasts: Bombay High Court acquits all 12 accused including 5 on death row.5. Evidence related to explosives found immaterialThe Court also found serious flaws in the handling of explosive materials recovered during the investigation. These included RDX, granules, detonators, pressure cookers, circuit boards and soldering equipment. The Court ruled that the prosecution failed to prove proper sealing and secure custody of these items before they were sent for forensic testing.“We have observed that the evidentiary value of these recoveries does not attach any importance on the ground that the prosecution failed to establish and prove the proper custody and proper sealing, which ought to be intact till the articles were taken to FSL,” the Court said.As a result, the recovered explosive material could not be reliably linked to the accused or the blasts. Moreover, the court observed that they were immaterial in the light of the fact that the prosecution failed to establish the nature of bomb employed in the blasts. .Senior Advocate Raja Thakare with Special Public Prosecutor A M Chimalkar with advocates Siddharth Jagushte, Akash Kavade, Aishwarya Sharma, Drushti Gala, Tushar C Nirbhavane instructed by Additional Public Prosecutors MM Deshmukh,G P Mulekar, R S Tendulkar, AD Kamkhedkar,PH Gaikwad and A R Metkari appeared for State of Maharashta. Advocate Yug Mohit Chaudhari with advocates Payoshi Roy, Hasan Nizami, Anush Shetty, Siddharth Sharma and Dashrath Gaikwad for the accused.Senior Advocate Nitya Ramakrishnan with advocate Stuti Rai instructed by Ansar Tamboli appeared for accused Tanveer Ansari and Naveed Khan.Senior Advocate S Nagamuthu, with advocates Payoshi Roy, Siddhartha Sharma appeared for accused Mohd. Faisal Shaik and Shaik Alim Shaikh.Senior Advocate S Muralidhar with advocate Ninni Susan Thomas, Maitreya Subramaniam and Ansar Tamboli appeared for accused Muzzammil Shaikh and Zameer Shaikh. Advocate Gaurav Bhawnani appeared for accused Mohd Shaikh and Suhail Mehmood Shaikh.Advocate Hetali Sheth appeared for accused Ehtesham Siddique.Advocate Khan Ishrat Azar Ali represented accused Mohammad Ansari and Mohammad Shafi.Advocate Aditya Mehta represented accused Asif Khan Bashir Khan and Shaikh Mohd. Ali Alam Shaikh..[Read Judgment]