USIS attack accused seeks parole to meet ailing sister
Times of India | 29 November 2024
12 Kolkata: Twenty-two years after the American Center attack, which put Kolkata on the global terror map, the state prison department received a parole application from Jamiluddin Nasir, lodged in Presidency correctional home for 21 years, to meet his ailing sister.
Nasir, along with Aftab Ansari, hatched the USIS attack plot and killed four police constables and a private security guard and injured 20 others on Jan 22, 2002, at the American Center. Nasir alias Javed, a Tiljala resident, was arrested eight days later. A trial court sentenced Aftab and Nasir to death and the Calcutta HC upheld the order. The Supreme Court, more than a decade ago, commuted the death sentence, ordering Aftab to remain behind bars till death and Nasir to spend at least 30 years in jail without remission. The apex court had said "the role of Nasir was always a shade lesser than what can be attributed to Aftab".
ADG (prisons) Lakshminarayan Meena confirmed that the parole had been moved. "Everyone has the right to move parole. There is a parole application, so it has been sent. It's an administrative decision, legal procedures will be followed," he said.
Sources said the prisons department would consult security agencies about Nasir's parole application. The Kolkata Police STF is overseeing the American Center attack case. If the STF objects, the parole proposal will be rejected and Nasir can't leave prison before the 30-year sentence ends. "We are yet to be consulted," said an STF officer.
According to a jail official, Nasir is extremely well-behaved but the parole stipulations for terror case convicts are stringent and are on a different footing than others.
In recent times, security agencies, including Lalbazar, objected to the early release plea of Rashid Khan, a life-sentence prisoner under TADA in the Bowbazar explosion case. They also objected to the early release plea of a convict involved in the murder of former DCP (port) Vinod Mehta. Despite the state's Sentence Review Petition Board taking up the cases, both pleas were rejected due to Lalbazar's objections. A similar proposal to revoke the same legal section for Aftab Ansari for cataract surgery was also rejected through a police report. A temporary OT was set up.