New Delhi, Aug 26 - Attorney General Goolam Vahanvati has advised the central government against challenging the acquittal of Bollywood star-cum-politician Sanjay Dutt from terror charges in connection with the 1993 bombings in Mumbai, law ministry sources say.

The sources said Vahanvati gave his view while confirming Solicitor General Gopal Subramanian's legal opinion in 2007 that the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) failed to adduce enough evidence against Dutt for his conviction under terror charges. He was convicted instead for illegal possession of arms.

Accordingly, Subramanian, then functioning as additional solicitor general, had told the government that owing to paucity of evidence linking Dutt to terrorism, the anti-terror court of Mumbai had rightly convicted him for only possessing illegal arms.

Subramanian had accordingly opined that it would not be a sound legal proposition for the government to go in an appeal against the anti-terror law's court verdict on Sanjay Dutt.

But the government had sought a fresh round of legal opinion from its top law officer on a plea by the CBI.