Overview
- Justices Sidharth Verma and Ram Manohar Narain Mishra set aside the 2019 Rampur trial court’s four death sentences and one life term, acquitting the five men on murder, UAPA and related counts.
- The court convicted Mohd. Sharif, Sabauddin, Imran Shahzad, Mohd. Farooq and Jang Bahadur Khan only under Section 25(1-A) of the Arms Act, imposing 10 years’ rigorous imprisonment and a fine of Rs 1 lakh each.
- The order directs that time already spent in custody be credited toward the Arms Act sentences.
- The judgment faults the investigation for the absence of test identification parades, weak chain of custody for fingerprints and cartridges, unreliable FSL reporting, and ballistic mismatches.
- Two of the appellants were identified in earlier proceedings as Pakistani nationals, and the court left the state free to pursue action over investigative lapses; two others had been acquitted by the Sessions Court for lack of evidence.