After the Supreme Court upheld Sanjay Dutt's conviction under the Arms Act in the 1993 Mumbai blasts case and sent him to five years in jail, his counsel Majid Memon Thursday said the Bollywood actor was "foolish" for illegally possessing weapons.
Dutt has been told to surrender in four weeks.
"Dutt was young and foolish back then for illegally possessing weapons. He is neither a traitor nor a terrorist. It is unfortunate that he has been branded a criminal for what can only be defined as foolishness," Memon told IANS.
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| Sanjay Dutt |
Memon said that even if Dutt pretended to be strong and showed courage, he surely was a broken man from within.
"He has already undergone a traumatic 20 years, which in itself is a big punishment for illegally possessing weapons," Memon said.
"Today, Dutt is a much different a person from what he used to be in the 1990s. He has also suffered a lot on account of his foolish act. He has been under the cloud of accusations because of the snail's pace of our litigation system," he added.
Memon said Dutt's team of counsel would carefully examine the apex court judgment, examine every word and explore possibilities of a review petition to get out of the situation.
"But in my view, the window is very narrow and hopes do not seem to be very high. The entire film industry has plunged into gloom the moment the news spread like wildfire," he said.
The actor, who was convicted under the Arms Act, was awarded six years' imprisonment by a Terrorists and Disruptive Activities (Prevention) Act court in 2007.
However, the apex court reduced the sentence to five years. This means Dutt will be in jail for three years and six months since he has already undergone 18 months' imprisonment.
The apex court upheld the death sentence of Yakub Abdul Razak Memon in the case and commuted the death sentence of 10 others.
The 13 serial bomb blasts that rocked Mumbai March 12, 1993, claimed 257 lives.
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