AN INDIAN court has convicted a Pakistani man on charges of murder and waging war on the country for his role in the deadly November 2008 terror strikes on Mumbai in which 166 people died.
Mohammad Ajmal Kasab (22), the only surviving gunman of 10 who executed the armed siege of Mumbai lasting more than 60 hours, sat impassively with his head bowed in court that found him guilty on all 86 charges filed against him.
Kasab, a resident of Pakistan’s Punjab province, will be sentenced later this week and could face the gallows.
“It was not a simple act of murder. It was war,” special judge ML Tahiliyani said in a summary of the 1,522-page judgment “Their type of preparation is not made by ordinary criminals. These are made in an organised type of war.”
Judge Tahiliyani acquitted two Indians, Fahim Ansari and Sabauddin Ahmed accused of helping to plot the attacks on the grounds that the evidence against them did not “inspire confidence”.
The prosecution plans to challenge their exoneration in a higher court.
India blames the Pakistan-based militant group, Lashkar-i- Taiba (LiT or Army of the Pure), for masterminding the attack that heightened tension between the neighbouring nuclear rivals.
In his verdict, the judge said Kasab was a LiT member and his “handlers” were in Pakistan.
After initial denials, Pakistan acknowledged that the attacks had been partially planned on its territory and that Kasab was one of its citizens.
Ten gunmen who had been trained, equipped and launched by the LiT navigated their way via the Arabian Sea from the southern Pakistani port city of Karachi to Mumbai. On November 26th, 2008, they laid siege to two of the city’s luxury hotels and a nearby Jewish centre.
They also attacked the main railway station packed with commuters, firing indiscriminately into crowds killing nearly 80 people. Kasab was one of the two gunmen who attacked the station and was captured on CCTV casually walking through it shooting at random with his assault rifle.
He and his accomplice also shot dead two senior Mumbai police officers who rushed to the station.
The judge said the gunmen came prepared for “sustained urban combat”, bringing with them everything from machine-guns, communication equipment to GPS devices.
The evidence against Kasab included footage from CCTV cameras in and around the train station and the testimony of more than 600 witnesses.
India also blames Islamabad for failing to act against those LiT members who planned the attack.
Pakistan denies this charge, claiming it is prosecuting seven suspected militants for their involvement in the Mumbai strikes.
The 271-day trial was conducted in four languages – including English and Urdu, amid tight security in a special purpose-built court in Mumbai’s high security Arthur Road Jail. Kasab had been held there since his apprehension on the first night of the attack.
Despite its many twists and turns, complexities, cross-border ramifications and an inordinately large number of witnesses, Kasab’s trial was concluded relatively speedily in India’s notoriously slow judicial system.
Kasab originally denied the charges, but last July in a dramatic outburst in court, admitted his role and asked to be hanged. Later he retracted this plea, claiming to have been tortured by police into making the confession.