The Supreme Court on Monday reserved orders on gangster Abu Salem’s plea seeking release from jail, claiming he had undergone the 25-year jail term that he was sentenced to.
Salem appealed to the top court after the Bombay high court dismissed his petition for release in April this year. Following his extradition to India, Salem was sentenced to life imprisonment by the Terrorist and Disruptive Activities (Prevention) Act (TADA) special court for the 1995 murder of businessman Pradeep Jain in 2015, and the 1993 Mumbai serial blasts, in 2017, respectively.
The bench had doubts. “Even by simple calculation, from your date of incarceration on November 11, 2005, you have not completed 25 years,” a bench of justices Vikram Nath and Sandeep Mehta said on Monday during the hearing.
Salem was extradited to face trial in the Mumbai blasts and Jain’s murder after the Indian government gave a sovereign assurance that he would not be sentenced to jail beyond 25 years.
When the trial court handed down a life term in the two cases, the Supreme Court on July 13, 2022, commuted his sentence to 25 years of imprisonment, in line with India’s solemn assurance to Portugal.
Senior advocate Rishi Malhotra, who appeared for Salem, said the period of incarceration should include the time that he spent as an undertrial and that the jail-earned remission should be counted against his prison term. He also pointed out that the high court had not decided which conviction date would be selected for counting the sentence.
While Malhotra urged the court to seek response from the Centre, the bench was not inclined and granted him permission to file his notes and judgments in support of his plea within a week.
In an earlier proceeding before the top court, the Centre had argued that his 25-year sentence began from November 11, 2005, when he was extradited from Portugal to face trial in multiple cases lodged against him, and would end in November 2030.
Salem has argued that the duration should be counted from September 18, 2002, when he was taken into custody in Portugal following a red corner notice issued by Interpol at India’s instance.
The Centre has, however, reasoned that Salem was taken into custody in Portugal in connection with a passport-related offence and his detention had nothing to do with the crime for which he was extradited.
Salem was a part of the underworld don Dawood Ibrahim’s syndicate and was sentenced to life imprisonment in February 2015 by a special TADA court for murdering Mumbai-based builder Pradeep Jain in 1995 along with his driver Mehndi.
In June 2017, Salem was again convicted and awarded a life sentence for his role in the 1993 Mumbai blasts case. He was found guilty of transporting weapons from Gujarat to Mumbai for use in the serial bombings, which left 257 dead and more than 700 people seriously injured.
