INDIA: SC STAYS EXECUTION OF DEATH PENALTY OF CONVICT IN RAJASTHAN BOMB BLAST CASE

The Supreme Court on 2 December 2019 stayed the execution of death penalty awarded to a convict in the 23-year-old case of bomb blast in a bus at Samleti in Dausa district, in which 14 persons were killed.
A bench of Chief Justice S A Bobde and Justices B R Gavai and Surya Kant ordered that condemned convict Abdul Hameed be not executed until further orders and agreed to hear his appeal against the Rajasthan High Court judgement upholding his death penalty in the 1996 terror attack case.
The High Court, in its 22 July judgement, had acquitted six persons while upholding the death sentence awarded to one and the life term to another in the bomb blast case.
The blast had taken place in a state roadways bus going to Bikaner from Agra on 22 May 1996. Fourteen persons were killed and 37 injured in the blast.