1996 Lajpat Nagar blast: Two death row convicts freed

A bench of justices S Ravindra Bhat and G P Mittal gave its ruling severely lashing out at the Delhi police and saying that "the flaw is not in the law but in its understanding and implementation by the police force."

The court commuted Jammu and Kashmir Islamic Front terrorist Mohd Naushad's death penalty to life term, while acquitting Mirza Nissar Hussain and Mohd Ali Bhat alias Kille, who had been given the capital punishment by the trial court.

The bench, however, upheld the life sentence given to third convict Javed Ahmad Khan alias Chotta Javed.

The court gave its verdict, rebuking the Delhi Police for its failure to adduce even "the minimum standard of proof."

"Unfortunately, the police has shown casualness. More often, it is such weaknesses and lapses which are the occasion for the State to complain that the courts insist on an impossible standard of proof, and that the law has to be interpreted 'realistically' or 'pragmatically.'

"It needs to be emphasised that the flaw is not in the law, or the standard of proof, which has, and will remain proof 'beyond reasonable doubt,' but in its understanding and implementation by the police force," the bench said in its 232-page verdict on the state's plea for confirmation of death penalty to the convicts and their cross-appeals.

A city court had in April 2010 convicted six alleged JKIF militants, awarding death sentence to Mohd Naushad, Mohd Ali Bhatt and Mirza Nissar Hussain while their fourth accomplice Javed Ahmed Khan was sentenced to life imprisonment.

Two others, Farooq Ahmed Khan and his woman accomplice Farida Dar, held guilty for offences under the Explosive Substances Act and the Arms Act, were sentenced to jail term for seven years and four years two months. Respectively.