A special Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act (MCOCA) court today convicted 12 and acquitted 10 persons in connection with the 2006 Aurangabad arms haul case, PTI reported. LeT operative and key plotter of the 26/11 Mumbai attacks Sayed Zabiuddin Ansari alias Abu Jundal is among those convicted.
On May 8, 2006, a Maharashtra ATS team chased down a Tata Sumo and an Indica car on Chandwad-Manmad highway near Aurangabad and arrested three terror suspects and seized 30kg of RDX, 10 AK-47 assault rifles and 3,200 bullets.
The Indica, allegedly driven by Jundal, managed to give police the slip. Jundal, who hails from Beed district of Maharashtra, drove to Malegaon and escaped to Bangladesh a few days later and then took shelter in Pakistan, the state police said.
He was deported to India from Saudi Arabia in 2012.
The special court here had framed charges against the 22 arrested accused in August 2013. During the trial, the prosecution examined 100 witnesses while defence lawyers examined 16.
The trial was stayed by the Supreme Court for a while after one of the accused challenged the constitutional validity of certain provisions of MCOCA. The stay was vacated in 2009.
In August last year, the Bombay High Court directed the lower court to expedite the trial.
