Tarqi Kazmi was sentenced to life imprisonment for his role in the 2007 Uttar Pradesh serial bombings.
An alleged operative of terrorist outfit Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami was today sentenced to life imprisonment after a district court in Barabanki, Uttar Pradesh, convicted him for his role in the November 2007 serial blasts that had rocked the court premises of Varanasi, Lucknow and Faizabad.
The court found Tarq Kazmi - reportedly a member of Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami - guilty of sedition and keeping explosives.
"I respect the court's decision but I refuse to accept it. I have been framed. The police had kept me in illegal detention before arresting me. I am definitely going to challenge the decision," said Kazmi from inside the police van, shortly after the judgment was announced.
In December 2007, Kazmi and another accused Khalid Mujahid were arrested by the Special Task Force of Uttar Pradesh police from Barabanki railway station, around 25 km from state capital Lucknow.
Kazmi's co-accused, Khalid Mujahid had died in 2013 in a police van after returning from a court hearing.
It was one of the terror cases that Akhilesh Yadav government had decided to withdraw keeping in line with the party's election promise of releasing Muslim men falsely implicated in terror cases. But the state government's plea to drop terror charges against the accused was turned down by the Allahabad High Court.
Kazmi's lawyer, Advocate Randhir Singh says that they plan to challenge the judgment in a higher court.
In March 2008, the then Mayawati government had set up a commission to probe the matter. The commission, it is report, had raised suspicion over the claims of the Uttar Pradesh police.