3 LeT militants awarded death penalty by Bengal court in sedition case

Three Lashkar-e-Taiba militants, including two Pakistani nationals arrested by BSF in 2007 from the Indo-Bangladesh border at Petrapole, have been sentenced to death by a court in Bongaon in West Bengal’s North 24-Parganas district in a case of waging war against the government.

Pakistani militants Mohammed Younus and Abdullah and an Indian, Muzaffar Ahmed Rathod, were sentenced to death by judge Binay Kumar Pathak of Bongaon fast track court-1.

The three have been booked under IPC Sections 120B (punishment of criminal conspiracy), 121 (waging, or attempting to wage war) and 122 (collecting arms with intention of waging war against the Government of India), CID DIG (Operations) Nishad Pervej told.

Abdullah and Younus are residents of Pakistan’s Karachi and Haripur respectively, while Rathod hailed from Jammu and Kashmir’s Anantnag.

They were arrested by BSF while trying to enter India through its international border with Bangladesh at Petrapole on April 4, 2007.

“They had a plan to attack army camps in Jammu and Kashmir, but before they could proceed with their plan they were caught by BSF and handed over to Bangaon police station,” he said.

The probe found that all the four were well-trained in using AK-47 rifle, hand grenades and manufacturing bombs.

Sheikh Abdullah Nayeem alias Sameer from Maharashtra, another LeT militant who was also arrested along with them, had managed to flee in 2013 when he was being taken to Mumbai.

During investigation, it was found that Abdullah was a teacher while Sheikh Abdullah Nayeem was an engineer by profession. They were involved in an incident of bomb blast in Mumbai.

The three underwent polygraph tests, narco tests and brain mapping during the probe conducted by the state CID, he said.