'When Terror Bombings Strike At Innocent Civilians, Death Penalty Emerges As Only Sanction': Telangana HC In Dilsukhnagar Twin Blast Case

"When terror bombings strike with calculated ferocity at innocent civilians, the death penalty emerges as the only sanction capable of matching the crime's existential threat," said the Telangana High Court while upholding death penalty imposed on five Indian Mujahideen operatives convicted for orchestrating the 2013 Dilsukhnagar twin bomb blasts which killed 18 and injured 131 persons.In doing so the court also underscored that the act was a "cold blooded conspiracy", with a "strategic selection of targets to maximize carnage and despair", where lives were extinguished, families were irreparably broken and a pervasive sense of insecurity was etched into the national consciousness. A division bench of Justice K Lakshman and Justice P Sree Sudha passed the order in a reference made by the trial court to confirm the 2016 death penalty as well as on an appeal appeal filed by the convicts– Asadullah Akhter Haddi Tabrez Danial Asad, Zia Ur Rehman, Mohd Tahseen Akhtar Hassan, Mohd Ahmed Siddibapa and Ajaz Shaikh Samar Armaan, operatives of the Indian Mujahideen.Attack on Hyderabad targeting civilians transcends ordinary criminalityThe bench, in its 357 page order pronounced on Wednesday, while upholding the capital punishment observed that the case falls into the category of rarest of rare cases. It said that the apex court had underscored that death is permissible only in the "rarest of rare" cases, where the alternative of life imprisonment is "unquestionably foreclosed." Examining various Supreme Court judgments on the subject the court thereafter referred to the present case and said:"The factual matrix before us is stark, unyielding, and demands our unflinching attention. The accused, propelled by a calculated design to destabilize the social order, executed a meticulously planned attack upon a bustling urban locale, a place of confluence for innocent civilians-men, women, and children untainted by any conflict. This was no spontaneous outburst; it was a cold-blooded conspiracy, marked by the deployment of sophisticated explosives, synchronized detonations, and a strategic selection of targets to maximize carnage and despair. The toll is staggering: lives extinguished, families irreparably broken, and a pervasive sense of insecurity etched into the national consciousness. The scale of destruction, both immediate and enduring, elevates this offense beyond conventional criminality, placing it in a realm where ordinary punishment falters. With unassailable certainty we believe that such an act of terror so deliberate, so devastating transcends the pale of routine adjudication, compels the "rarest of rare" doctrine's most stringent and uncompromising application to restore justice's equilibrium".It thereafter observed, "When an offence is not merely a crime against individuals but an assault on civil order itself, the weight of justice must correspond unflinchingly to the enormity of the transgression. This attack at Hyderabad, deliberately targeting civilians in busy streets with a series of coordinated bombings, represents an act that transcends ordinary criminality". Not an impulsive act, supported by network of external actorsThe bench further said that the destruction left behind by the blast, the lives it claimed, "and the terror it instilled place it in a category beyond conventional crime", necessitating an assessment under the strictest application of Supreme Court's decisions in Bachan Singh and Machhi Singh.It underscored that the attack was not an "impulsive act but the product of an extensive conspiracy" executed with precision and supported by a "network of external actors". It emphasized that every stage–from training to execution–was marked by calculated intent. It further said:"The accused, acting in concert with others, embarked upon a meticulously planned operation designed to inflict maximum casualties. The strategic selection of targets—densely populated areas ensuring the highest number of deaths and injuries—underscores the deliberate nature of the offence. Such cases demand an analysis not merely of individual culpability but of the systemic and premeditated manner in which terror was unleashed upon unsuspecting civilians. Such acts of terror, aimed at annihilating the very foundations of societal stability, necessitate death penalty as the sole bulwark of justice and order". Victims were defenceless, rarest of rare threshold obliteratedThe court observed that the victims were- defenseless men, women, and children–who were chosen not for who they were as individuals but for what they represented—a "society targeted in its entirety". The court thereafter said that the act fell into the categories formulated in Machhi Singh and Yakub Menon–which are depraved intent, extreme brutality, anti-social nature–a war against the State, magnitude of lives lost/enduring trauma, victim vulnerability. The court thereafter said that the law does not mandate the imposition of capital...

'When Terror Bombings Strike At Innocent Civilians, Death Penalty Emerges As Only Sanction': Telangana HC In Dilsukhnagar Twin Blast Case

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