New Delhi, Dec 18 (IANS): Four followers of Hindu sect Anand Marg were Thursday sentenced to life imprisonment here for criminal conspiracy and murder of then railway minister L.N. Mishra in 1975.
District Judge Vinod Goel awarded life imprisonment to Gopalji (73), Ranjan Dwivedi (66), Santoshanand Avadhuta (75) and Sudevananda Avadhuta (79).
The maximum punishment under which the four were charged entail death penalty.
They were convicted Dec 8 on charges of murder, criminal conspiracy and voluntarily causing grievous hurt by dangerous weapon.
Santoshanand Avadhuta and Sudevananda Avadhuta were also convicted and punished under the Explosive Substances Act.
Awarding life imprisonment, the court held that the case does not come under the "rarest of rare" category where the death penalty can be given.
"I find this is not a cold blooded murder and the convicts do not bear trace of any personal animosity with the victim. They do not appear to be a menace to the society," the court said.
"The crime was committed during the prime of their youth about 40 years ago. Now they are elderly figures and this is a period of self-introspection. There is every possibility of their reformation. Therefore, this is not a rarest of rare case where capital punishment is invited," the ruling said.
The four convicts were in the packed court when order was announced.
Defence lawyers said they will challenge Thursday's order.
L.N. Mishra had gone to Samastipur Jan 2, 1975 to inaugurate the Samastipur-Muzaffarpur broad gauge railway line. A bomb explosion on the dais seriously injured him.
He was rushed to the railway hospital at Danapur where he died the next day.
Two others died in the explosion while 25 more, including L.N. Mishra's brother Jagannath Mishra, were injured. Jagannath Mishra later became the chief minister of Bihar -- thrice.
The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) alleged that Anand Marg followers carried out the attack on Mishra to put pressure on the central government to release one of the group's leaders.
All the four convicts, who were out on bail, were taken into custody after the court's Dec 8 order convicting them in the case.
Santoshanand Avadhuta and Sudevananda Avadhuta have already spent over 12 years in jail while Gopalji had remained behind bars for 11 years. Dwivedi was in jail for three years.
The Supreme Court had transferred the case to Delhi in 1979. The charges were framed in 1981.
On the direction of the apex court, the lower court began hearing the final arguments daily since September 2012. Over 160 prosecution witnesses and around 40 defence witnesses were examined.