Today’s History: In 1993, there were 13 blasts in Mumbai within 2 hours; Yakub was hanged after 22 years; Dawood still absconding

Blasts took place at 13 places including the stock exchange in Mumbai on this day on 12 March 1993. In this 257 people died. More than 700 were injured. A blast took place at 1:30 pm in the basement of the 28-storey building of the Bombay Stock Exchange, in which around 50 people were killed. Half an hour later, there was a car explosion and in less than two hours there had been a total of 13 explosions. Property worth about Rs 27 crore was damaged.

In this case, on November 4, 1993, a 10,000-page preliminary chargesheet was filed against 189 accused. The case was handed over to the CBI on 19 November 1993. The trial of this case started on 19 April 1995 in TADA court in Mumbai. In September 2006 the court began delivering its decisions.

There were 123 accused in this case, out of which 12 were sentenced to death by the trial court. 68 people were sentenced to less than life imprisonment, while 23 were presumed innocent. The Supreme Court had commuted the hanging of all the people except Yakub Memon to life imprisonment. Yakub was hanged in 2015. Tiger Memon and Dawood Ibrahim are still absconding in this case.

In November 2006, Sanjay Dutt was found guilty of possessing a pistol and an AK-56 rifle. Sanjay Dutt was sentenced to 6 years imprisonment. In 2013, the Supreme Court upheld the sentence, but reduced the sentence by one year to five years. Sanjay Dutt surrendered in May 2013. He was released from Yerwada Jail in Pune in February 2016.

Gandhiji started the Dandi March
Gandhiji and his volunteers started the Dandi March on 12 March 1930. The main objective was to ‘break the salt law’ made by the British. Gandhiji started walking towards the sea from his ashram at Sabarmati. At the beginning of this movement, along with 78 satyagrahis, Bapu, who had set out for Dandi march, joined the public as they reached Dandi. After reaching Dandi on April 6, 1930, 25 days later, he broke the salt law on the beach.

During the Dandi Yatra, after Surat, Dindori, Vanj, Dhaman, Mahatma Gandhi made Navsari his stop in the last days of the Yatra. From here the journey of Karadi and Dandi was completed. They reached Dandi after traveling about 390 kms. This was the period when the British government had a monopoly on things like tea, cloth and even salt.

In the British Raj, Indians did not have the right to make salt, but they had to pay many times more money for the salt coming from England. Over the next few months after the Dandi March, 80,000 Indians were arrested. This ignited a spark, which later turned into a ‘Civil Disobedience Movement’.

Important events that happened in the country and the world on March 12-

2018: Thousands of farmers in Maharashtra started the march for Mumbai.

2014: Due to heavy snowfall and avalanche in Kashmir, 14 people died in India-Pakistan.

2008: The US Air Force removed the F-117, the world’s first stealth fighter, from its fleet.

1970: The minimum voting age in the US has been lowered from 21 to 18.

1894: Coca-Cola was first sold in bottles.

1884: The first women’s US state college was established in Mississippi.

1755: In America, the first steam engine was used to extract water from the mine.