Man awarded death penalty for 'waging war against country'

Kolkata: A Bongaon court on Saturday sentenced Sheikh Abdullah Nayeem, alias Sk Samir, who had links with terror outfit Lashkar-e-Taiba, to death for "waging war against the country".

The court held Samir guilty on Tuesday and the quantum of sentence had been scheduled to be pronounced by the court on Saturday. Apart from the death sentence, the court also imposed a penalty of Rs 50,000 on him.

An additional district sessions judge of Bongaon fast track court attributed the death sentence to Sk Samir after he was guilty of various charges. The accused had been apprehended by the Border Security Force in April 2007 on suspicion of being a member of the terror organisation and was later handed over to the police.

The Criminal Investigation Department (CID) was assigned to conduct the probe. After a detailed investigation, the CID charged him with waging war against the country. He had also been involved in procuring arms and explosives, besides other charges. The three other accused — Mohd Younis, Sk Abdullah and Muzaffar Ahmed Rathore had been sentenced to death by the same court in 2017.

It may be mentioned here that Samir had escaped from police custody in 2014 when he was being taken to Mumbai in transit in connection with the trial in a different case in

Maharashtra. He was again arrested by the NIA from Delhi in 2017 and was handed over to the CID.