The Gujarat High Court on Tuesday acquitted Mumbai-based businessman Birju Salla by quashing the conviction and life imprisonment awarded by the special National Investigation Agency (NIA) court in the case of grounding of a Mumbai-Delhi flight in 2017.
In 2019, the NIA court found him guilty and awarded him life imprisonment under the amended anti-hijacking law. Mr. Salla was the first person to be booked under the stringent Anti-Hijacking Act, 2016. In fact, he was also the first person to be put in the national “no fly list” of the Ministry of Civil Aviation.
The High Court held that the trial court sentenced him for the offence of hijacking “on the premise of evidence which is tainted with doubt.”
