The Supreme Court's refusal to stay execution of Yakub Memon on Wednesday drew sharp reactions from legal experts.
Triggering controversy over capital punishment to Yakub Memon in Mumbai blasts case, All India Majlis-E-Ittehadul Muslimeen president Asaduddin Owaisi on Friday sought to know whether the perpetrators of demolition of disputed structure in Ayodhya, communal riots of Mumbai and Gujarat and other such sensational cases would get a similar punishment.
Those set free include Suleiman Memon, brother of prime accused Tiger Memon and Raheen Memon, wife of another accused Yakub Memon.
"It can stay awake till midnight to hear the Yakub Memon case and it can extend the hearing of the Ram Janmabhoomi title case for three months, while crores of Indians wait for it."
Ujjwal Nikam, special public prosecutor in 1993 serial blasts case, on Thursday said the Supreme Court upholding death penalty to Yakub Memon will send a strong message to the absconding accused in Pakistan that they will also be brought to book.
A ruckus followed as BJP MLAs took a strong exception to the statement.
Yakub Memon's mercy petition was rejected hours before he is scheduled to hang by a three-member bench amid high drama that saw the Supreme Court throwing its doors open in the middle of the night in an unprecedented move.
Memon said that the opposition should introspect why Modi keeps getting such a "positive mandate" and dismissed suggestions of manipulation of EVMs, an oft-repeated complaint of the Congress and other political parties.
Earlier, Yakub, while giving a statement on quantum of punishment after his conviction, had raised the same issue saying those indicted by Srikrishna Commission of Inquiry probing the 1992-93 Mumbai riots, should be punished.
'Nationalism has been defined for us. It is what the BJP and Modi bhakts decide, not me, you or Salman Khan. If you don't agree with their view, you are a Pakistani agent and an anti-national. Period. No more argument. The discussion ends there.'
Samajwadi Party leader Mohammed Farooq Ghosi has been suspended after stirring a controversy by requesting party supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav to nominate 1993 Mumbai serial blasts convict Yakub Memon's wife as a Rajya Sabha MP.
'My confidence in the Indian judiciary is absolute after I saw justice being delivered in Gujarat even when a BJP government was ruling the state. The Muslims of Gujarat believed that they will never get justice in a BJP-ruled state, but the facts are before all of us to make a judgment.'
In his post, the suspect wrote he wished to give up his Indian citizenship and become a spokesperson for the ISIS -- the terror group which currently controls a large part of Iraq and Syria.
Pakistan and its spy agency Inter-Services Intelligence had played a vital role in imparting training to convicts to handle weapons and explosives, which materialised in the 1993 Mumbai serial blasts, the Supreme Court held.
Does India's first majoritarian government that is hard-focused on economic development have it in it to provide the Muslim community the healing touch? On evidence available so far, I am not hopeful at all. Yet, like the besieged community, I too find it impossible to abandon hope in the land's millennia-old syncretic traditions, says Saisuresh Sivaswamy.
Prachi's controversial outburst that sparked an outrage also saw her asking the Centre to hand over Pakistani terrorist Mohammed Naved Yakub to Hindu organisations.
'As a police officer, I had gone on deputation to the prison department; on both occasions (the hanging of Ajmal Kasab and Yakub Memon), the government said that I should remain present.' 'I was not mentally prepared for these sensitive operations and had to work on myself to lead the teams.'
A chronology of events in the case in which the main trial ended in 2007.
The actor was convicted under the Arms Act but acquitted under the TADA anti-terror law. He has filed an application in the court seeking his release under the Probation of Offenders Act.
A three-judge bench was on Tuesday set up in the Supreme Court to decide the fate of Yakub Memon, the lone death row convict in 1993 Mumbai blasts case, after a two-judge bench was divided on his plea seeking stay of his execution scheduled on July 30
Article 72 of the Constitution empowers the president to grant pardons, reprieves, respites or remissions of punishment or to suspend, remit or commute the sentence of anyone convicted of any offence.
There are many instances in the past where the top court sat through midnight to hear the special cases.
Rediff.com takes a look at some instances of underworld dons and terrorists detained or arrested in a foreign country and deported or extradited back to India.
Sanjay Dutt is among the 123 accused in the case.
Unfazed by criticism, former Union minister Shashi Tharoor opposed death penalty even for terrorists saying it was an "obsolete practice" and they should instead be put behind bars for the rest of their lives without parole.
Government on Thursday accused Congress of being "irresponsible" for not allowing Home Minister Rajnath Singh to make a statement in Rajya Sabbha on the Gurdaspur terrorist attack, which it said had originated from Pakistan.
It is when one looks away from the immediate song and dance and at the granular detail of what has been going on since 2014 that one realises what the quality and competence of thinking and execution is in this project we call New India, asserts Aakar Patel.
Paving the way for his execution, the Supreme Court on Thursday rejected the review plea of Yakub Abdul Razak Memon, sole death row convict and a co-conspirator of fugitive Dawood Ibrahim in the 1993 Mumbai serial blasts case.
'Where in parliamentary democracies around the world do political parties drag Supreme Court judges in the middle marches of the night to decide who will rule?' asks Sunil Sethi.
News channel CNN-NEWS18 released video evidence of Dawood Ibrahim's presence at D 13, Block 4, Clifton, Karachi in Pakistan, a claim that Islamabad has denied for 23 long years.
When asked whether he had tried to help Geeta, Salman said he would have got involved but the government is already looking into the matter.
Usman Majeed, a MLA from north Kashmir's Bandipora, claims that Tiger had told him during a meeting in 1993 that he was responsible for the Mumbai blasts and that Pakistan had ideated and helped him carry out the attacks.
'The colloquial language forced a turn to the recent past and I thought about the hangings of men like Afzal Guru and Yakub Memon.' 'Whatever their deeds, proven or still in doubt, did their deaths not deserve to be mourned by a sister, wife, or child?' A fascinating excerpt from Amitava Kumar's Writing Badly Is Easy.
One accused was acquitted by the court.
A bench of Chief Justice T S Thakur and Justices R Banumathi and U U Lalit fixed the contempt plea for hearing on Monday when the plea alleged that by terming the execution as "judicial killing", Kumar and others have committed contempt of the court which had delivered the verdict.
The detailed role of the six convicts in the case, whose trial was separated from the main one, which concluded in 2007.
Former Union Home Minister Sushil Kumar Shinde on Friday denied having used the word "Hindu terrorism" in Parliament during the UPA tenure.
In the wake of heightened threat perception, the Supreme Court has curtailed the entry of visitors including law interns in the high security complex and requested advocates to be extra-cautious of any suspicious activity within its premises.
His comment came after the Shiv Sena attacked him for petitioning the president to save Mumbai blast convict Yakub Memon from the gallows.
'As a governor, I have every right to speak my mind if I feel the security of my country is at stake.' 'Why is it that we would have to shed tears when Muslims are killed or tortured, but have to keep mum when the Hindus receive the same treatment?'
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