Siwan sultan guilty again

Patna, May 5: A Siwan special court today convicted RJD MP Md Shahabuddin for abducting a CPI(ML) activist in 1999 with the intention to murder.

However, the court today acquitted the RJD MP in a 1997 assault case and a case involving a 1991 bomb blast in a DAV school in Siwan.

Delivering the verdict, the special court judge Gyaneshwar Srivastva said a verdict on the quantum of punishment for the incarcerated MP would be delivered on May 8.

The CPI(ML) activist concerned, Chhote Lal Gupta, was abducted near a railway crossing in Siwan on February 5, 1999, by Shahabuddin, the court ruled.

Gupta is feared to have been killed, as the police have not been able to either trace him or recover his body.

On March 1, the Siwan court had awarded two years’ rigorous imprisonment to the RJD strongman for atta- cking the office of CPI(ML) functionary Kaishav Baitha in 1998.

Shahabuddin, facing over 40 cases of murder, kidnapping, extortion and criminal intimidation, is currently lodged in Siwan jail.

In the past 16 years, more than 40 cases have been registered against Shahabuddin. He has been facing simultaneous trial in 15 cases by fast-track courts.

He has been acquitted in 14 other cases due to the absence of witnesses or because the witnesses turned hostile in court.

The RJD strongman also faces the charge of murdering JNU student Chandrasekhar in 1997.