Dutt after offering puja at Siddhi Vinayak temple on Monday. (PTI)

Mumbai, Nov. 27: Sanjay Dutt faces his toughest trial yet tomorrow with the special court trying the 1993 Bombay blasts issuing him a summons for the final verdict.

The star faces charges of possessing an AK-56 rifle that was part of the arms consignment smuggled into Maharashtra for the March 12 blasts. He has been asked to report at the Arthur Road Jail court along with six others, including some friends.

If convicted, Sanjay’s bail will be cancelled and he could be taken into custody. He faces a jail term ranging from five years to life, the only silver lining being that the 16 months he spent in prison in 1993-94 could shorten the sentence a little.

The summons to Sanjay, however, came on a day Judge Pramod Kode sent out mixed signals from his courtroom. He convicted an Abu Salem aide who took away two AK-56 rifles from Sanjay’s Pali Hill home, but acquitted the star’s friend Ajay Marwah of charges of possessing a 9mm pistol and cartridges that were part of the same cache.

“God is great. I have finally got justice,” Marwah said as he hugged his wife waiting outside the court. Earlier, he bowed before Kode and said, “Thank you.”

The case against Sanjay revolves around three AK-56 rifles, a 9mm pistol, ammunition and hand grenades allegedly delivered at his house in January 1993 by Salem and his aides, Samir Hingora and Baba Musa Chauhan, on instructions from Dawood Ibrahim’s brother Anees. The actor is believed to have later returned most of the weapons, retaining only one AK-56 and the 9mm pistol.

Salem’s associate Manzoor Ahmed Sayed Ahmed had collected the weapons Sanjay returned and ferried them to co-accused Zaibunnisa Kazi’s house. He was today convicted, under the anti-terror law, of abetting and aiding the conspirators.

But Marwah, one of Sanjay’s four friends accused of possessing and destroying weapons at the actor’s home, was given the benefit of the doubt. He was acquitted of all five charges against him, including criminal conspiracy, abetting a terrorist act and possessing weapons.

Sanjay faces exactly the same charges as Marwah, who owns two cinemas in Mumbai.

The judge said the case against Marwah rested only on the recovery of the 9mm pistol from his home. Since it had been passed on to Marwah’s brother by Sanjay’s friend Russi Mulla, with instructions to return it to another friend Kersi Adajania later, Marwah could be given the benefit of the doubt.

Sanjay had apparently called his friend Yusuf Nullwala from Mauritius in April 1993 and asked him to destroy the AK-56 rifle and the 9mm pistol lying in his bungalow. Nullwala and Adajania had tried to melt the AK-56 and passed the pistol on to Mulla. Nullwala, Mulla and Adajania have been summoned tomorrow, along with Sanjay. So have been Kazi, Chauhan and Hingora.

Today, two senior customs officials were also convicted of abetting the blasts by accepting a bribe to facilitate arms-landing on the Raigad coast.