Court Hands Death Penalty To Ahmed Murtaza Over Gorakhnath Temple Attack

The UP NIA Court has sentenced the death penalty to the ISIS-trained Ahmed Murtaza Abbasi as he had attacked two policemen with a sharp weapon at Gorakhnath Temple.

Ahmed Murtaza Abbasi, 30, was convicted and given a death sentence by a special court in Lucknow on Monday, January 30. 

Abbasi had been found guilty of using a sharp object to strike and hurt two police constables when he attempted to enter the Gorakhnath shrine in Gorakhpur in April of last year.

Yogi Adityanath, the chief minister of Uttar Pradesh, is the head of the temple. The anti-terror squad court’s special judge, Vivekanand Sharan Tripathi, also fined Abbasi Rs 44,000.

Tripathi had previously heard the case for 60 straight days and had found Abbasi guilty of violating Indian Penal Code Sections 121 (waging war against the Government of India) and 307 (attempt to murder).

Prashant Kumar, a second assistant director general of police, stated: “Abbasi received a life sentence under Section 307 and the death penalty under Section 121 of the IPC. In the past 60 days, the case has been heard frequently.

Abbasi attempted to enter the shrine on April 3, 2022, and attacked the security guards stationed there with a sickle, injuring two Provincial Armed Constabulary constables, Gopal Gaur and Anil Paswan, according to the FIR filed in April 2022. He was taken down by the security guards present and later arrested.

Abbasi had received training from ISIS and had frequent communication with terrorists and others who support terrorism, according to earlier claims made by the Uttar Pradesh police. 

He was the lone wolf of ISIS and an authority in terror funding. He was in contact with ISIS members and engaged in the electronic distribution of terrorism literature, according to DGP Chauhan. Abbasi is a graduate of the Indian Institute of Technology in Bombay.

Only the “rarest of rare” situations are given the death penalty in India. According to data from Project 39A that was just made public, trial courts will issue 165 death sentences in 2022, which is a record high for more than 20 years.