SC dismisses the appeal of eight gangsters

New Delhi, Apr 29 (UNI) The Supreme Court has dismissed the appeal of eight gangsters from Ahmedabad, who were found guilty of kidnapping a textile mill owner and seeking a ransom of Rs one crore for his release.

A total of 14 accused were charged for offences under various sections of the IPC and TADA. The TADA Judge, Ahmedabad convicted eight and aquitted others. However, one of the accused died while the trial was still underway.

The victim Ved Prakash Devkinandan Chidipal, owner of Chidipal Textile mills was kidnapped on February 22, 1994 from where he was blindfolded and kept in illegal confinement till the ransom amount was paid.

A bench comprising Chief Justice K G Balakrishnan and Justice G P Mathur, upheld the conviction and sentence of the appellants observing ''all these sectors when taken into consideration, we do not find difficulty in accepting the confession made by accused number 12 Musa Khan alias Baba Khan. His confession seems to be not a segment of his imagination, but appears to be a true account of the kidnapping and extortion of money. Therefore, we do not find any illegality in the conviction, as recorded against these accused.

The Criminal Appeal number 1228 of 2004 filed by the accused is without any merit and is liable to be dismissed." The appellants are Abdul wahab, Nazir Mohammad Vora, Abdul Fattar and Salim Noor Mohammad Haveliwala and others.

The court also dismissed the appeal made by the State Government of Gujarat against the aquittal of other accused.

The conviction was mainly challenged on the grounds that confessional statement was recorded by DCP and it was not voluntary as the same was retracted next day. The court however, found the confessional statement voluntary and held "all confessions are invariably retracted at a later stage, therefore, the retraction by itself is not a ground to discard the confession by holding that it was not voluntarily made. The DCP had taken all precautions to ascertain that the confession was voluntary." UNI