Bansri Shah, Pune
Syed Abdul Karim, alias Tunda, the primary accused in the 1993 serial bomb blast case, was acquitted by a special court in Rajasthan under the Terrorist and Anti-Disruptive Activities Act (TADA) on February 29, based on a lack of evidence.
Shafqat Sultani, Tunda’s lawyer, told ANI, “Abdul Karim Tunda is innocent; today the Court gave this judgment. Abdul Karim Tunda has been acquitted in all sections and all acts. CBI prosecution could not produce any concrete piece of evidence before the court in TADA, IPC, Railway Acts, Arms Act, or Explosive Substances Act.”
Tunda, who is said to be closely associated with Dawood Ibrahim, was arrested under allegations of carrying out the serial blasts of December 1993 that took place on the same day as the Babri Masjid demolition in 1992 a year before. These blasts, which took place in Mumbai, Hyderabad, Delhi, Rohtak, and Jalandhar, killed two and left several injured. He has been accused of being the mastermind behind more than 40 bombings in India before he fled to Bangladesh. Tunda, who is said to be an expert bomb maker, is also alleged to be associated with groups such as Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), Harkat-ul-Jihad al-Islami (HUJI), Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM), and many others.
He was finally arrested by Indian authorities in 2013 at the India-Nepal border in Banbasa. However, he was pardoned in 2016 because Delhi police could not provide evidence that Tunda, who has an amputated hand, was a bomb-maker. He has also been cleared of the charges for the Sadar Bazaar and Kotla bomb blasts for a lack of evidence.
However, Tunda has faced other charges of terrorism, conspiracy, murder, and waging war against the state. He was sentenced to serve a life imprisonment term in 2017 under Section 307 (attempt to murder) and 120 B (criminal conspiracy) of the Indian Penal Code and Section 3 of the Explosives Substances Act for his involvement in the 1996 Sonepat bomb blasts case. Moreover, he had to pay a fine of Rs. 1 lakh for the same.
While Tunda has been acquitted in the 1993 bomb blast case, the two other accused, Irfan alias Pappu and Hamiduddin, who were also arrested in September 2021, are still serving out their sentences.