Ex-parliamentarian Shahabuddin gets life imprisonment in murder case of two brothers

Patna:

Former parliamentarian and once close aide of Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) president Lalu Prasad Yadav, Mohammad Shahabuddin was on Friday sentenced to life imprisonment by a local court in Bihar for murdering two brothers by giving them an acid bath about a decade ago. This is the second time in the past few years that Shahabuddin has been awarded life imprisonment in a case of kidnapping-cum-murder.

Additional District Judge of Siwan special court Ajay Kumar Srivastava pronounced the judgement, terming it as the “rarest of rare case”. The court also awarded life-term to three of his associates for similar charges.

The judgement comes two days after the court had convicted former parliamentarian now languishing in jail, along with his associates — Rajkumar Sah, Shaikh Aslam and Arif Hussain — for killing the brothers in cold blood and also destroying the evidence after the crime. Despite serious efforts, the police were never able to recover the bodies, the court said.

The victim side, however, expressed dissatisfaction over the court’s judgement saying they wanted capital punishment. “We honour the court judgement, but it would have been fair if the murders of my sons were awarded death,” said Chandra Keshwar Prasad, father of victim sons.

Shahabuddin’s lawyer Abhay Kumar Rajan said they would challenge the court judgement in the upper court. “We maintain that Shahabuddin was in jail on the day of murder … No jail official has been named. So, how can it be proved that my client was not in jail on the day of the murder?” asked Rajan.

Shahabuddin’s wife Heena Shahab said she would knock the doors of High Court for justice, though she said she respected the court’s judgement.

According to the police records, on the fateful day three sons of local businessman Chandra Keshwar Prasad were kidnapped from their home in Siwan district by three accomplices of Shahabuddin and taken to Pratappur village where two of them were killed in cold blood by pouring acid on them. Pratappur is the native village of Shahabuddin. Despite repeated efforts, the bodies of the victims could not be recovered by the police. The third kidnapped victim, though, somehow managed to escape and save his life.

Later, a case of murder was registered with the local police by victims’ mother Kalawati Devi, charging Shahabuddin’s three henchmen with the murder of her sons. Officials said initially Shahabuddin was not made an accused in the case but during the course of investigation, his name cropped up and he too was made an accused for hatching a conspiracy to kidnap the three siblings.

The lone surviving brother appeared before the judge as an eyewitness in the case, but was subsequently murdered by unidentified assailants in June 16 last year.

Dreaded gangster-turned-politician Shahabuddin is currently cooling his heels in a local jail for the past over a decade in connection with some 40 criminal cases pending against him, such as murder, kidnapping, theft, violation of Foreign Exchange Act and treason. He has already been sentenced to life-term in connection with kidnapping-cum-murder of a Communist Party of India (Marxist-Lenninist) leader, 10-year imprisonment for possessing illegal arms and ammunitions, as well as three year’s rigorous imprisonment in a case of vehicle theft.