Bengaluru, April 27, 2026
A special National Investigation Agency (NIA) court on Monday sentenced terror accused Mohammed Shariq to 10 years of rigorous imprisonment in connection with the Mangaluru cooker blast case.
Shariq had pleaded guilty before the court during the trial.
The convict was charged under Sections 121A, 122, and 326 of the UAPA Act. The period of imprisonment already undergone will be set off against the total sentence.
Shariq sought a reduction in his sentence, stating that he has only one daughter and is the sole breadwinner of his family.
Meanwhile, the second accused, Syed Yasin, pleaded not guilty, and the trial against him will continue. Both accused were produced before the court via video conference from prison.
The incident occurred on November 19, 2022, near Kankanady in Mangaluru. According to investigators, Shariq was allegedly on his way to plant an improvised explosive device at the Kadri Manjunath Temple when the cooker bomb detonated prematurely, averting a major tragedy.
Shariq sustained injuries in the blast. The autorickshaw driver, Purushottam Poojary, was also injured in the explosion.
After undergoing treatment for nearly three months, Shariq was taken into NIA custody for further interrogation. The agency later completed its investigation and filed a chargesheet in the case.
Shariq also confessed to conducting trial blasts in Shivamogga and painting anti-national graffiti on walls in public places in Mangaluru, according to the NIA.
The accused No.1, Mohammed Shariq is known as Shariq aka Mohammed Sharik Premraj Hutagi aka Premraj aka Gowli Arun Kumar.
Shariq, 27, who hails from Shivamogga, admitted to the charges nearly three years after the explosion inside an autorickshaw on November 19, 2022. He initially pleaded not guilty when the court framed charges on April 20, 2024, but reversed his stand in December 2025 by submitting a fresh plea under Section 229 (Conviction on plea of guilty) of the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC).
According to the NIA, Shariq is part of an Islamic State-inspired Shivamogga module connected to multiple terror-linked incidents since 2020. At the time of the blast, he was already wanted in a September 2022 Shivamogga case involving IED testing by the same module. He was earlier arrested in 2020 for writing anti-national graffiti in Mangaluru.
The module is also accused in the March 1, 2024 Rameshwaram Cafe blast in Bengaluru, where investigators believe an IED similar to the one allegedly carried by Shariq was planted by founding member Mussavir Hussain, along with the now-arrested Abdul Matheen Taha.(Agency)
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