Dawood Ibrahim and Yakub’s brother, Tiger Memon, are the main accused in those blast cases.
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He added, “This execution will not deliver justice for the 1993 Mumbai blasts”.
CPI(M) leader Sujan Chakraborty described his comments as “insensitive and irresponsible”. It was one of the very few occasions when Indians from across the political spectrum, from its disparate and squabbling extremities, paused briefly in their daily abusing of one another to express their respect and affection for the man. Hindutva activists, Congress supporters, Leftists, Muslim intellectuals, people from the northeast, all mourned Dr Kalam. Justice A.R. Dave, who favoured the dismissal of Yakub’s plea to stay his execution, spelt this out graphically: “If king doesn’t punish the guilty with red eyes then entire sin will come on the king”. Even as India mourns the death of SP Baljit Singh and other courageous officers of Punjab Police, large sections of our civil society pleaded the cause of Yakub Memon.
Memon’s lawyers cited a Supreme Court judgement in another case to argue that he can’t be hanged for at least 14 days after his mercy plea was rejected by President Pranab Mukherjee on Wednesday.
Repeated filing of mercy petitions frustrates the principle of finality, said Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley.
“The government has given us a ray of hope”, one man told news channel India Today, without giving his name. “All it does is exact retribution, unworthy of a government”, the Thiruvananthapuram parliamentarian said.
He, however, later added that he was not going into the merits of the Yakub case but was opposed “to the principle and practice of the death penalty in our country”.
Justice Srikrishna: Yes, I feel so and I have said so earlier. It would also be legitimate to ask why those involved in the Gujarat riots – for instance the Maya Kodnanis of the world or those named in the Babri Masjid demolition case – are roaming free.
The Congress party leadership remained silent through it all with a brief news item that was not seen again in detail declaring its support for Memon’s execution.
BJP secretary Shrikant Sharma said Congress leaders’ remarks underlined the conflicting voices in the opposition party over the issue of terrorism.
The Memon case is an interesting example of our collective schizophrenia and myopia on matters of national security and policing.
Yakub’s final hours were marked by high drama with three Supreme Court judges sitting twice, the last time around 4am, three hours before the time set by the trial court for his hanging, to dispose of petitions filed by him or by others, including some eminent citizens, on his behalf.
Minister of State for Parliamentary Affairs Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi said justice had been done.
What was remarkable about the episode was the protracted judicial process which preceded the 7.35 a.m. hanging. It is irrevocable. If the court had sentenced Yakub Memon to 50 years in jail, there would have been no controversy.
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THE death by hanging of Yakub Abdul Razak Memon, the lone death-row convict in the March 12, 1993 Mumbai serial blasts case, on the morning of July 30, holds a mirror to Indian democracy, political parties, and the justice system. But the definition is debated and the only executions in recent years have been of convicted terrorists. Our otherwise vigilant and vociferous media, NGOs, intellectuals and above all elected representatives, haven’t thought it fit to seek a review of this judgment.
