The verdict

When film actor Sanjay Dutt was sentenced on July 31, 2007 to six years’ rigorous imprisonment under the Arms Act, the fate of three of his friends was also decided by Special TADA [Terrorist and Disruptive Activities (Prevention) Act] Judge P. D. Kode on the last day of the 14-year long trial. Yusuf Nulwalla (54) was given five years, Kersi Adajania (76) two years but got bail, while Rusi Mulla (64) was the only co-accused to be granted probation. Kode did not mince words, as per The Times of India (TOI) of August 1, 2007. He said that not only had Nulwalla and Adajania actively participated in getting rid of Dutt’s AK-56 rifle and a 9-mm pistol, but they had also involved Mulla in their criminal activity, observing that none of the three were immature youths at the time of the crime (which occurred just before the serial bomb blasts shook Bombay in 1993). They had, without regard for the law, rushed to destroy the weapons as soon as Dutt had asked them to do so over the phone from Mauritius, where he was shooting for a film, TOI reported the judge as saying.

Mulla, a spare parts dealer, remained unsmiling after the verdict and refused to speak to the media though he was deemed the luckiest, having been granted a year’s probation on a one lakh rupee surety amount. He was the first to know his fate. He and his family have maintained silence about the events since the 1993 blasts. After the sentencing, Adajania, in whose foundry Dutt’s assault rifle had been melted down, looked calm; he received bail because his sentence was only for two years in prison. Later, Adajania said: "He (the judge) could have given me probation.”

Tension ruled in Adajania’s Chira Bazaar home as his elderly wife sat with two female relatives, their eyes glued to the television screen in the modest apartment on the ground floor of Kareem Manzil, reported Hindustan Times (HT) of August 1, 2007. Distressed neighbors stood guard outside, protecting the grief-stricken family and turning away visitors. "It is a tragedy,” said a relative, who did not wish to be named. "A man who goes to the fire temple every day, who has never been to a police station, has been sentenced for the blasts. He is not a criminal.” The relative angrily informed HT: "Dosti ki wajah se phas gaya (he got trapped because of his friendship),” adding that an ailing man who has suffered a heart attack and has impaired vision in one eye was given a jail sentence. Adajania’s son Viraf, who had had a long day in the court, looked relieved, but would not speak to the Press, reported TOI on August 1, 2007. Five oil lamps are lit every day on the concrete wall outside Adajania’s house by the Parsi women of the building. On July 31 there were flowers near each of the lamps, revealed TOI. "Both of them are heart patients (the Adajania couple) and very tense. Two years is bad enough,” a neighbor told TOI.

Mulla’s neighbors in Mon Repos building at Bandra’s Bandstand were thrilled. "Everyone in the building prayed for him,” one of them said, describing him as "god-fearing,” as per the HT report.

There has been a groundswell of sympathy for Dutt in the aftermath of the verdict. However, eminent jurist and former attorney general of India Soli Sorabjee has justified the six years’ jail sentence and cautioned against any signal being sent of a "celebrity justice delivery system,” because of the actor’s status and the support he is getting from some Congress leaders, reported TOI of August 6, 2007. Dutt’s sister Priya, MP, Priya Ranjan Dasmunshi and Kapil Sibal all from the Congress party, have spoken in his favor. On a television broadcast Sorabjee termed as "inappropriate” their questioning the correctness of the judgment, saying Dutt’s was a "serious offence.” Responding to the view that public opinion found the sentencing excessive and unfair, Sorabjee replied "if public opinion is misinformed I will ignore it. Does the public know that the minimum sentence is five years and that it cannot be reduced? Justice Kode would have committed an illegality if he had given him three years,” as per the TOI.

In a similar case former Shiv Sena MP Madhukar Sarpotdar was acquitted on April 29, 1998 under the Arms Act on the charge of possessing unlicensed firearms in a riot-torn area in Bombay, reported TOI dated August 4, 2007. Almost a decade later his political rival Sunil Dutt’s only son got sentenced for the very same charges under the same Act, notes the TOI. At that time it was maintained that Sarpotdar was let off for lack of evidence, but now TOI has his 16-page acquittal order which states that it was failure of the police which undermined the prosecution’s case.

According to HT of August 3, 2007, in the government’s reply to social activist Teesta Setalvad’s Right to Information application, the status of the case is unclear. Setalvad asked for the status of ‘chargesheet,’ ‘acquittal’ and ‘conviction.’ The home department’s reply leaves these columns blank for Sarpotdar’s case. "This (the blanks under the headings) means that the case against Sarpotdar appears to have been dropped by the Shiv Sena-BJP, and subsequent governments made no attempt to reopen it,” Setalvad told HT, adding that she had applied for more unambiguous information about government action.

Sorab Ghaswalla recalls, in the same issue of HT, how he broke the story of Sarpotdar’s arrest while he was a reporter with The Indian Express in 1993. "The police receipt stated that Sarpotdar and the others had been in a jeep when the army column led by Major Goswami had stopped and searched them, leading to the seizure of weapons, including seven live cartridges, choppers and hockey sticks. The army handed the weapons over to the police since it could not arrest civilians… A night court had freed Sarpotdar on a personal bond of Rs 2,000. Mumbai was then a TADA notified area, but the police booked all of them under the Arms Act. No answers were forthcoming about why TADA was not applied,” Ghaswalla’s reported stated.

The acquittal of Sarpotdar and the stiff sentences to Dutt, Nulwalla, Adaja­nia and Mulla caused much consternation especially among the minority community as did the fact that the culprits named in the Sri Krishna Report that probed the 1992-93 riots were never brought to book.

Boman Irani who starred with Dutt in Munnabhai MBBS and Lage Raho Munnabhai stated in an article in The Week, August 12, 2007: "On verdict day, we were too depressed to speak to anyone. Frankly, it would have been very naïve of us not to anticipate such a sentence. It is the letter of law, and we knew that Sanjay would be punished. But we were emotionally hopeful that he would walk free.”

Three weeks after he was sent to jail, Dutt was granted bail by the Supreme Court, along with five others. They will have to surrender after they receive copies of the judgment.