MUMBAI, March 20 -- Sixteen years after they were arrested allegedly for possessing illegal weapons including a carbine and over 70 live cartridges, a magistrate's court has acquitted three individuals charged under the Arms Act. One of the accused, Ali Hasan Abdullah Qureshi, died last month and the trial against him was abated. Qureshi, his brother-in-law Nasir Shaikh Ahmad Shaikh, an autorickshaw driver, and Jubeda Abdul Mansuri were acquitted by an order of additional chief judicial magistrate SD Panjwani on March 10. The anti-terrorism squad (ATS) had arrested the trio following an FIR filed in June 2010. A day earlier, an ATS team had intercepted Shaikh near Shreyas Cinema in Ghatkopar and seized a blue bag in which they found an iron carbine gun, six steel-body pistols with magazines, and 70 live cartridges. Police claimed that Shaikh told them he was carrying the weapons on the instructions of his brother-in-law Qureshi. The ATS then visited Qureshi's house in Jogeshwari and arrested him after allegedly finding four steel-body pistols and 29 live cartridges under the mattress of his wooden bed. They arrested Mansuri after Shaikh and Qureshi allegedly told them that she had supplied the weapons. While the ATS had reportedly claimed that Shaikh and Qureshi were aides of fugitive gangster Dawood Ibrahim Kaskar, the prosecution made no such claim before the court. The magistrate observed that eight of the nine witnesses examined by the prosecution were police witnesses. While the prosecution said the witnesses supported its case, Shaikh and Qureshi's defence lawyer Umang Shah said that for the seizure of weapons made in a crowded place, there were no independent witnesses. Mansuri's advocate claimed her name was not in the FIR and no arms were recovered from her. The magistrate also said that "it raises doubt why no such station diary entry was made in respect of such a big raid". The court also said the sanction for prosecution of the accused under the Arms Act was invalid as it was "given by sanctioning authority on perusal of papers in (a) routine manner and without seeing the weapons and letter for sanction."...