Indian Mujahideen (IM) terrorist Ariz Khan was on Monday convicted for the murder of Delhi Police Inspector Mohan Chand Sharma and other offences in the 2008 Batla House encounter case. 

The encounter was carried out at the Batla House in Delhi’s Jamia Nagar on September 19, 2008, where two suspected IM terrorists were killed and another was arrested. Inspector Sharma lost his life, while two other police officers were injured. 

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The encounter took place six days after the serial bomb blasts across Delhi, Rajasthan, Gujarat and Uttar Pradesh. The IM had claimed responsibility for the blasts and said it was carried out as revenge for the 1992 demolition of the Babri Masjid. 

At least 165 people were killed in the blasts, which targeted cities like Jaipur and Ahmedabad, apart from the national capital itself. More than 500 others were injured in the blasts. 

The Batla House encounter operation was initially meant to only gather information on the residents of the building, but escalated to an encounter after the suspects allegedly started firing at the police.

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Two terrorists were killed in the encounter while Khan and another accomplice Shahzad Ahmad fled the scene. Ahmad was caught in 2010 and, in 2013, was given a life imprisonment term in connection with the case. 

Khan, a resident of Uttar Pradesh’s Azamgarh, was caught by the Delhi Police Special Cell in 2018. After fleeing from the encounter, he shifted his base to Nepal and also visited Saudi Arabia in order to strengthen the organisation.