Yakub Memon's body reaches Mumbai, will be buried soon

Nagpur/Mumbai: Hours after 1993 Bombay Blast convict Yakub Memon was hanged to death at the Nagpur Central jail, his body has reached Mumbai where he will be buried. His body was handed over to his family soon after the formalities were completed at the jail. The burial in all likelihood will take place at Marine Lines where his father is also buried.

Security has been significantly stepped up across Mumbai to avoid any untoward incident in the city. As per sources, the National Security Agency (NSA) has is also monitoring the security situation in the city. Rapid Action Force (RAF) and Quick Reaction Team (QRT) units have been deployed at the spot.

The authorities have laid the conditions that the burial should be low key and must be completed in a stipulated time. The execution took place at 6:43 am on Thursday morning after his last minute plea in Supreme Court was rejected.

Memon was sentenced to death by a special TADA Court on April 29 for his role in the 1993 Mumbai serial blasts case. He was sent to the gallows coincidentally on his 54th birthday on Thursday. He was hanged after several of his court appeals and clemency petitions were rejected by various courts till early Thursday morning.

Memon's body was sent for an autopsy in the jail hospital by a medical team from a Nagpur government hospital, shortly after his death before being cleared for the last rites.

Initially, the jail authorities were not inclined to hand over the body and planned to perform the last rites in an isolated spot in the jail campus.

After the hanging, Memon's brother Sulaiman submitted an application to the jail authorities, demanding body to be handed over to them to enable them perform the last rites in Mumbai. The request was immediately processed and conditional permission was granted to them before handing them the body.

Chief Minister Devednra Fadnavis is likely to make a statement in the Maharashtra Legislature later in the day.

Memon was the first and the only convict out of 100 in the 1993 Mumbai bomb blasts case whose hanging was upheld by the Supreme Court. The death sentence of 11 others was commuted to life.