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The Bombay High Court has acquitted all 12 persons accused of having carried out seven blasts in suburban trains in the city on July 11, 2006. This came nearly 10 years after a special court had sentenced five of them to death and others to life imprisonment.

The court said that the prosecution had “utterly failed” to establish the guilt of the accused persons. It remarked that while punishing the perpetrators of a crime is an essential step, creating a “false appearance of having solved a case” would lead to a misleading sense of resolution.

The five persons who had been sentenced to death by the trial court are Kamal Ansari, Mohammad Faisal Ataur Rahman Shaikh, Ehtesham Qutubuddin Siddiqui, Naveed Hussain Khan and Asif Khan. All had been held guilty of planting the bombs.

The seven others who had been sentenced to life imprisonment by the trial court are Tanveer Ahmed Ansari, Mohammed Majid Shafi, Shaikh Mohammed Ali Alam, Mohammed Sajid Margub Ansari, Muzzammil Ataur Rahman Shaikh, Suhail Mehmood Shaikh and Zameer Ahmed Latifur Rehman Shaikh. More on Scroll.

Former Kerala Chief Minister and veteran communist leader VS Achuthanandan has died in Thiruvananthapuram at the age of 101. He had been hospitalised after a cardiac arrest in June, and had been on a life support system since.

Achuthanandan had withdrawn from public life after suffering a minor stroke in 2019. He had since been living with his son, V Arun Kumar, at his home in the state capital.

Achuthanandan was elected as state secretary of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) in 1980 and held the post for 12 years. He was the convener of the Left Democratic Front from 1996 to 2000.

He served as the chief minister of Kerala from 2006 to 2011. More on Scroll.

Congress chief Mallikarjun Kharge has urged the Centre to provide more clarity about efforts to find the terrorists responsible for the April 22 Pahalgam attack. He noted while addressing the Rajya Sabha that none of the attackers had yet been caught or killed.

The leader of opposition in the Rajya Sabha said that after the attack, all parties had extended unconditional support to the government, and emphasised that the Centre should “inform us about what happened”.

Kharge further said that the chief of defence staff, the Deputy Army chief, and a senior defence attaché had made revelations concerning Operation Sindoor that ought to be clarified. Kharge was referring to their acknowledgments that India incurred losses during the initial phase of the conflict, although the number of aircraft downed has not been disclosed yet.

The Congress leader also said that US President Donald Trump's claims of having brokered a ceasefire between India and Pakistan were an insult to the country. Read more.

The Supreme Court asked why the Enforcement Directorate was being used for “political battles”, and said that such battles must be fought outside the court. A bench headed by Chief Justice BR Gavai rejected an appeal by the agency against a Karnataka High Court decision to quash summons issued to Chief Minister Siddaramaiah’s wife Parvathi in an alleged land scam.

The alleged scam pertains to the allotment of 14 high-value housing sites in Mysuru’s Vijaynagar area to Parvathi, in 2021 by the Mysore Urban Development Authority under a state government scheme.

This was allegedly done in exchange for 3.1 acres of land that Parvathi owned in another part of the city. The land was allegedly illegally acquired from Dalit families. More on Scroll.

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