Coimbatore blasts verdict on Aug 1

The verdict in the 1998 Coimbatore serial blasts case will be pronounced on August 1.

The blasts, triggered in and around Coimbatore on February 14, 1998, during the visit of Bharatiya Janata Party leader Lal Kishenchand Advani on that date for election campaign, claimed 52 lives besides loss of property worth over Rs 100 crore.

There will be a meeting to discuss the mode of judgment -- conviction, sentence or aquittal -- on July 27, C Aboobacker, one of the defence counsels, told PTI.

A total of 166 persons, majority of them being reportedly the members of proscribed Al-Umma, including its leader S A Batcha Mohammed Ansari and Kerala-based People's Democratic Party leader Abdul Nasser Mahdhani have been arrested in connection with the blasts and have been in jail for the last eight years.

The trial had begun in a special court on March 7, 2002, and the agruments completed on April 10, 2007.