Bombay High Court upholds Abdul Rauf’s conviction Gulshan Kumar murder case

By LE Desk

Mumbai, July 1, 2021: The Bombay High Court on Thursday upheld the conviction of Abdul Rauf alias Dawood Merchant in the Gulshan Kumar murder case and sentenced him to life imprisonment. 

While affirming the conviction, the court refused to grant entitlement of remission to Rauf, observing that he had jumped his parole and run away to Bangladesh. In short, the act of the accused on the matter of record disentitled him from any leniency.

As per the Indian Express News Service, the Division Bench of Justices SS Jadhav and NR Borkar partly allowed the appeals against acquittals of the other accused in the case, including one Bollywood producer Ramesh Taurani, on the charges of abetment to murder.

Abdul Rauf alias Dawood Merchant was sentenced to life imprisonment by the Mumbai sessions court in 2002 in the murder case of Gulshan Kumar, founder of T-series. The court has set aside Rauf’s conviction under robbery sections, reported India Today.

Gulshan Kumar, the founder of the T-Series music label and a Bollywood movie producer, was killed on August 19, 1997, in Juhu. Several people were arrested and prosecuted in his murder cases.

The Mumbai police had named 26 people, including Music composer Nadeem Akhtar Saifee, in its 400-page charge sheet in the murder case. Both Saifee and Ramesh Taurani, owner of Tips cassettes, were named as co-conspirators.

While Taurani was arrested for abetting Kumar’s murder, Saifee managed to evade arrest and fled to the United Kingdom.