The Supreme Court of India on Wednesday pronounced that Pakistani microbiologist Mohammad Khalil Chisti, who was convicted and sentenced to life in an over two-decade-old murder case, was free to go back to his country.
The 80-year-old Pakistani national had filed an appeal in the apex court against his conviction.
The SC ordered that Chisti be freed as the sentence served by him so far was enough.
No further custody is required, a bench of Justices P Sathasivam and Ranjan Gogoi said.
In April this year, the SC had granted bail to Chisti on humanitarian grounds.
Chisti, a virologist in the Karachi Medical College, was sentenced to life imprisonment last January after an 18-year-long trial in a murder case.
Chisti and some others had been accused of killing a man, identified as Irshid, in a fight in April 1992.