“Jealousy and religious differences” led Ayaz Saiyed – the lone accused-turned-approver in the July 2008 Ahmedabad blasts case – to testify against the co-accused, said three of the 38 convicts awarded death sentence.
In their deposition before the court, while three convicts have explicitly mentioned Ayaz’s “hostile” behaviour towards them, the rest have denied the approver’s testimony.
Accused number 4, Ahmedabad native Shamshuddin Shahabuddin Shaikh, who was handed a death sentence, had told the court that Ayaz, who was later identified as Prosecution Witness 1141, had named him only “out of sheer personal enmity and jealousy, which he nurtured… since our police custody”.
Shaikh also told the court that the two belonged to different sects of Islam as Ayaz was a Sunni Barelvi and Shaikh was not. “He (Ayaz) was Sunni Barelvi who believes in fateha and dargah, while I am Sunni non-Barelvi who does not believe in it; these differences further increased his hatred and enmity towards me. Time and again, he used to get enraged for petty issues.”
Shaikh narrated an incident when the two were in DCB custody in November 2008, when the police officers allegedly “instructed” them “to submit whatever amount we possessed for tea”. While Shaikh handed over all the money, Ayaz retained some money and faced the consequence.