The youth identified as Javed Ahmed Tantray and Aashiq Ali Bhat were released five years after being arrested on charges of being activists of Hizbul Mujahideen.

“The charges against were dismissed by a sessions court on Thursday with the judge saying it was a ‘clear-cut plant case’ by the Special Cell” the daily reported.

"The entire story of the prosecution is fabricated and they have falsely implicated the accused to gain publicity and out-of-turn promotion," the defence told the court.

The two were arrested on August 6, 2009, from Daryaganj and police claimed to have recovered two AK-47 rifles, two pairs of loaded magazines and two hand grenades from their car.

The Special Cell had declared the arrests ‘a successful mission averting a national crisis on Independence Day’, it said.

Police had told the court that the duo drove to Delhi from Jammu in a stolen Santro to carry out suicide attacks in crowded places in Delhi.

The prosecution proved in the court that the stolen Santro was planted by police.

“Toll receipts revealed that the car was driven from Delhi to Jammu on the morning of August 6, 2009. It is the police who took the vehicle to Jammu in the morning and brought it back to Delhi in the evening," the defence told the court.

The police failed to produce any material to show ‘any connection of the accused persons with any terror organisations’. No diary entry was made in the local police station regarding the operation; there were inconsistencies in the testimony of the prosecution witnesses, one of whom also failed to identify the accused in court. Police had made no investigation regarding the alleged call made by Tantray to his associate in Pakistan, the defence alleged.