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Batla case: Shahzad gets life term
Legal Correspondent

New Delhi, July 30
A Delhi court today awarded life sentence to suspected Indian Mujahideen (IM) terrorist Shahzad Ahmed for gunning down police inspector MC Sharma in an encounter in Batla House area in South Delhi’s Jamia Nagar on September 19, 2008.

Additional Sessions Judge Rajender Kumar Shastri rejected the Delhi police plea for awarding death penalty to the convict, observing that the crime did not fall under the rarest of rare category.

The encounter had taken place when a Delhi police team was raiding the Batla House flat in Jamia Nagar in South Delhi on a tip off that terrorists involved in the September 13, 2008 serials blasts in the capital were hiding there. As many as 26 people were killed and 133 injured in the blasts. The Judge noted that the encounter had not been planned by Shahzad and four others. There were more mitigating circumstances in favour of the convict than aggravating factors to tilt the scale against sending him to the gallows, he explained. Among the aggravating circumstances was his attempt to prevent the police team from conducting the raid.

Of the five terrorists holed out in the Batla House flat, two were killed in the encounter, while another is still untraceable. Another person was not even made an accused in the case as he had remained passive during the encounter and surrendered thereafter.

The trial court had convicted Shahzad on July 25. It had also ruled that the encounter was not fake as claimed by some.

Shahzad was found guilty of attempting to kill head constables Balwant Singh and Rajbir Singh, besides gunning down Inspector Sharma.

Found guilty

• The trial court had convicted Shahzad on July 25.
• It had also ruled that the encounter was not fake as claimed by some.
• Shahzad was found guilty of attempting to kill head constables Balwant Singh and Rajbir Singh, besides gunning down Inspector Sharma.
• Among the aggravating circumstances was his attempt to prevent the police team from conducting the raid.