Afzal Guru, the main accused in the 2001 Parliament attack, was hanged

 

Mohammad Afzal Guru 

Afzal was a Kashmiri militant who surrendered to the BSF in 1993; thereafter, fighting odds stacked against surrendered militants, he started his own business in surgical equipments in Kashmir; seeing him doing well, the Jammu and Kashmir STF and even sections of the Indian army started harassing him for money; he was picked up and tortured on several occasions; one such instance saw him shelling Rs 100,000 to stave off torture; the pressure on him — as on all ex-militants — was that he should become a Special Police Officer (SPO) or an informer of the Indian army; during one of his torture sessions, Afzal met Tariq, a person working for the J&K STF. Tariq advised him to cooperate with the STF; soon, in 2001, STF’s Davinder Singh, who besides extracting money, had tormented Afzal on several occasions, asked him to take a man to Delhi. 

Muhammad Afzal Guru’s execution on Saturday morning — a grim spectacle, where the Indian government disgraced itself by denying his family a last meeting, or a dignified burial — has set off perhaps the most serious debate on the death penalty India has ever seen. Legal experts have cast no small doubt on whether Guru received a fair trial; whether his guilt was proved; whether his death penalty was legitimate. These debates engaged some of India’s finest legal minds for months, both on the side of the state and defence. The Supreme Court’s word is not, and ought not to be, the final word. Indeed, the deep ambiguities that surround Guru’s case are in themselves compelling argument to rethink the death penalty. 

Conviction

On 18 December 2002, a death sentence was given to Afzal Guru, S A R Geelani and Shaukat Hussain Guru, while Afsan Guru was let off. In August 2003, Jaish-e-Mohammed leader Ghazi Baba, who was a prime accused in the attack was killed in an encounter with the Border Security Force (BSF) in Srinagar. Three other militants, along with him were also killed in the 10-hour encounter. In October 2003, on an appeal, Delhi High Court upheld the order.
The judgment mentions:

"The gravity of the crime conceived by the conspirators with the potential of causing enormous casualties and dislocating the functioning of the Government as well as disrupting normal life of the people of India is something which cannot be described in words. The incident, which resulted in heavy casualties, has shaken the entire nation and the collective conscience of the society will be satisfied if the capital punishment is awarded to the offender."

On December 19 2001 he made a confession of the offenses, which was recorded and signed by him. He also confirmed having made the confessional statement without any threat or pressure.

He was convicted for the offenses under Sections 121, 121A, 122, Section 120B read with Sections 302 & 307 read with Section 120B IPC, sub-Sections (2), (3) & (5) of Section 1, 3(4), 4(b)of POTA and Sections 3 & 4 of Explosive Substances Act. He was also sentenced to life imprisonment on as many as eight counts under the provisions of IPC, POTA and Explosive Substances Act in addition to varying amounts of fine.

An appeal was made to the Delhi High Court, but after going through the case and taking into consideration various authorities and precedents, the Court found that the conviction of Afzal Guru was correct and hence his appeal was dismissed. The co-accused in the case, S.A.R Geelani, was acquitted by the high court.Hence, although initially, the death penalty was meted out to S.A.R Geelani (who was presented as the mastermind behind the attack), Afzal Guru and Shaukat Hussain Guru, only Afzal Guru's death penalty was upheld by the Supreme Court.

In August 2005, Supreme Court, while confirming the death sentence of Afzal Guru, commuted Shaukat Hussain Guru's death sentence to 10 years of rigorous imprisonment.

In October 2006, Afzal Guru's wife Tabasum Guru filed a mercy petition with then President A. P. J. Abdul Kalam. In June 2007, Supreme Court dismissed Afzal's plea seeking review of his death sentence, saying "there is no merit" in it. In December 2010, Shaukat Hussain Guru was released from Delhi's Tihar Jail due to her good conduct.

For More About  Mohammad Afzal Guru  Click here