Raheen outside court on Tuesday. (Fotocorp)

Mumbai, Sept. 12: Hanifa Memon is 70 years old and arthritis-ridden.

Today, she and her entire family based in India stood before Judge P.D. Kode of the special Tada court trying the Bombay blasts case as he starting delivering his verdict.

Hanifa’s eldest son Tiger Memon, said to be hiding in Pakistan with brother Ayub, is suspected to be the brain behind the 1993 blasts. The rest of the family was charged with being part of the conspiracy.

Judge Kode convicted her three sons Yakub, Essa and Yusuf and daughter-in-law Rubeena but acquitted Hanifa, son Suleman and daughter-in-law Raheen.

The acquittal, though, was not clean. “I have concluded that I will give them the benefit of the doubt. It is not a clean acquittal but it is short of being guilty,” the judge said, reading out the verdict.

Out on bail since 1997 because of ill health, she now lives in Dongri in south Mumbai. The family residence at Al-Husaini building in Mahim was sealed in 1993.

Her neighbours say Hanifa has not missed her evening prayers since July 27 when Judge Kode said he would deliver the verdict on August 10.

All the seven in court today had fled to Pakistan early on the morning of March 11, 1993 — a day before the blasts. Tiger had followed them the morning after, hours before 250 people were killed in Mumbai.

Yakub flew back to New Delhi from Dubai in August 1994 accompanied by wife Raheen, brother Yusuf, sister-in-law Rubeena and parents Abdul Razzaq and Hanifa. All of them were arrested by the CBI on arrival.

Hanifa spent close to 39 months in jail. Abdul died in 2001, when he, like his wife, was out on bail on medical grounds.

Essa and Suleman, who arrived separately, were also arrested. But other than Yakub, all the Memons were granted bail.

Raheen, 32, was crucial to the cracking of the case. An abandoned Maruti van containing AK-56 rifles and hand grenades was found in Worli after the blasts.

It was registered in her name and led the police to the Memon home in Al-Husaini building where they found more evidence. When the family was arrested in 1994, Raheen was already pregnant with her only child Zubeida.

Not much is known about Suleman, the father of three who is out on interim bail since 1997 and was let off today. His wife Rubeena, though, has been convicted.