AJOY ASHIRWAD MAHAPRASHASTA - Ishrat Jahan: After the Fake Encounter, a ‘Phoney’ Probe
As long as they are not found, the ‘missing documents’ will allow the BJP to turn what is a straightforward case of custodial murder into a political football
NB: If the facts reported by the Indian Express are true, what has transpired is the blatant subversion of the criminal justice system by a senior official in the Home Ministry. This is a disgrace to the country; but in tune with the behaviour of this government for many months - see some of the links below. Our opinion-makers can talk all they want about 'development' and 'growth', but the elephant in the drawing room is the brutal attempt by the Sangh Parivar to do away with the distinction between lawful and unlawful violence. The recent appearance of one of the fake encounter accused in the company of the RSS leader shows that they wish to habituate us to controlled mobs and arbitrary killings by the police. This has become so shameless that even a respected retired police officer has denounced the governments nefarious machinations. We are witness to a creeping coup taking place in full light of day - all that the government needs now is our complicity and silence. DS
NB: If the facts reported by the Indian Express are true, what has transpired is the blatant subversion of the criminal justice system by a senior official in the Home Ministry. This is a disgrace to the country; but in tune with the behaviour of this government for many months - see some of the links below. Our opinion-makers can talk all they want about 'development' and 'growth', but the elephant in the drawing room is the brutal attempt by the Sangh Parivar to do away with the distinction between lawful and unlawful violence. The recent appearance of one of the fake encounter accused in the company of the RSS leader shows that they wish to habituate us to controlled mobs and arbitrary killings by the police. This has become so shameless that even a respected retired police officer has denounced the governments nefarious machinations. We are witness to a creeping coup taking place in full light of day - all that the government needs now is our complicity and silence. DS
'Police was definitely involved, but got away': Survivors and activists rue Gulberg verdict
Narendra Modi's Republic of Fear
Narendra Modi's Republic of Fear
B K Prasad, the Union
Home Ministry official who headed the probe into the “missing documents” in the
Ishrat Jahan encounter case, not only told a witness the questions he would ask
but also suggested to him what answers he should give — that he had not seen
any of the documents. This coaching of a witness by the man heading the
investigation puts a question mark on the integrity of the probe announced in Lok Sabha by Union Home
Minister Rajnath Singh on
March 10.
New Delhi: If there is one case that exposes the
fragility of Indian democracy in recent times, it is the killing of Ishrat
Jahan in 2004. Both the Bharatiya Janata Party and the Congress have been at
loggerheads over the killing of the young teenaged woman from Maharashtra, who
at different points of time after her death has been branded a
Lashkar-e-Tayyaba operative and an innocent victim of a fake
encounter engineered by the Gujarat police on the orders of the BJP state
government.
Human rights activists
have decried her killing as a fake encounter; the Congress’s flip-flop –
initially calling her a terrorist and then a victim of a fake encounter – has
triggered suspicion over its intentions. The BJP, quite naturally, has been the
only party to support the Gujarat government’s action, given the fact that
party president Amit Shah and Prime Minister Narendra Modi, the chief minister
of Gujarat at the time of Ishrat’s killing, have directly or indirectly
been implicated in the case since the probe began.
At no point of time
has the probe functioned in a transparent manner. Depending on their
political agenda, officials and politicians have leaked selective
information about the case to establish their views, leading to highly
polarised and uninformed opinions on the matter. This opacity showed
of yet again when a senior home ministry official, B.K. Prasad, who
headed an official probe into the case documents that have gone missing, was captured on tape by an Indian Express reporter
trying to doctor his own investigation. Prasad retired from
service after his probe began but has been given an extension.
The opposition has
long attacked the BJP for doing its best to ensure the case – which
has already led to the framing of abduction and murder charges by the
Central Bureau of Investigation – never gets to court. Forced to respond
to the opposition’s attack, Union home minister Rajnath Singh created a furore
in the Lok Sabha in March, when he said that five important documents had disappeared from the home
ministry records and blamed the previous UPA government for
this. Singh instituted a probe, which Prasad headed. At that time,
most BJP leaders questioned the Congress’s conduct in the matter and
alleged that it tried to falsely frame the BJP and Gujarat police for political
gains.
It is a different
matter that the missing documents have no bearing on the criminal case, which
is about the custodial killing of Ishrat Jahan. The state is obliged to
prosecute those charged regardless of whether there is evidence suggesting she
was connected to the LeT or not.
Either way, the tables
have now turned. The BJP will have a lot to answer for. Prasad, who has also
been criticised by civil society groups for clamping down on dissenting NGOs by
slapping allegedly false charges of violating the Foreign Contribution
Regulation Act, submitted an inconclusive report stating that the missing
files may have been deliberately removed or unintentionally misplaced. However,
the fact that he has been caught coaching at least one of
the witnesses to deny any knowledge of the missing papers not only
delegitimises the probe but also suggests Prasad was acting to a political
script. That the BJP has never been enthusiastic about opening the can of worms
that Ishrat’s case has now become was already known. But the way it has tried
to directly manipulate the probe and influence the investigative agencies in
the last few months points towards deep-seated structural corruption in the
government machinery. The BJP in power today has clearly forgotten its campaign
against the UPA government’s attempts to turn the CBI into a ‘caged
parrot’.
Though they are not
relevant to the murder case, the significance of the missing documents lies in
the fact that they detail the exchange between the the then home
minister P. Chidambaram, home secretary G.K. Pillai and former
attorney general G.E. Vahanvati, who passed away two years ago. The trail of
letters and draft affidavits is of particular importance as they document
how – and possibly why – the Congress shifted its stand from
originally branding Ishrat a terrorist to stating she was a victim of a fake
encounter. The flip-flop was preceded by metropolitan magistrate S.P.
Tamang’s report that accused the Gujarat police of a fake encounter. The
missing papers also apparently include the second affidavit filed by the home
ministry during UPA rule, in which it said it had no evidence to
sustain the charge that Ishrat was a terrorist.
Even 12 years after
Ishrat’s killing, the case is still in limbo, despite an SIT probe and a
magistrate’s report implicating the Gujarat police. As long as they
are not found, the ‘missing documents’ will allow the BJP to turn what is a
straightforward case of custodial murder into a political football that can be
kicked around to discredit the Congress and divert attention away from the
original crime.
The question
the BJP will have to answer is why it had to manipulate the probe
into the missing papers if it was certain the Congress’s second affidavit was
false and politically motivated. After all, an honest probe would have
revealed any misconduct by the Congress and the UPA – a scenario from
which the BJP would have immensely benefitted both electorally and politically.
Chidambaram hits
out: Predictably, the
tainted probe has infused confidence in the Congress’s ranks. Chidambaram
has already said that he stands vindicated. In a statement, he said:
“The news report
published in the Indian Express today (16 June 2016)
comprehensively exposes the fake controversy created by the NDA government on
the two affidavits filed by the Central government in the Ishrat Jahan case. The Indian
Express report completely vindicates the position that I had taken on
the two affidavits. The first affidavit (6 August 2009) disclosed the
“intelligence inputs” that had been shared by the central government with the
state government. Judge Tamang in his report (7 September 2009) found that
Ishrat Jahan and three others had been killed in a fake encounter. The report
caused an uproar in Gujarat and elsewhere. The first affidavit was
misinterpreted and misused to defend the encounter. It was, therefore,
necessary to clarify the first affidavit. Hence, a ‘further affidavit’ was
filed (29 September 2009) clarifying that intelligence inputs “do not
constitute conclusive proof and it is for the state government and the state
police to act on such inputs.”
The contents of the
‘further affidavit’ (especially paras 2 and 5) are absolutely clear and
correct. It is unfortunate that most people who commented on the matter had not
cared to read the ‘further affidavit’. The five “missing”
documents completely vindicate the position I had taken. The sequence of events
conclusively establish that we had acted in a totally transparent manner. The
draft of the ‘further affidavit’ was vetted by the attorney general, the
highest law officer of the country, before it was filed. The file passed
through the hands of the home secretary at least 3 or 4 times. Ultimately, the
‘further affidavit’ was filed in court on the orders of the home secretary. Of course, I take full
responsibility for filing the ‘further affidavit’ which was absolutely the
correct thing to do.
The moral of the story
is that even a doctored report (of the inquiry officer) cannot hide the truth.
The real issue is whether Ishrat Jahan and three others were killed in a
genuine encounter or a fake encounter. Only the trial of the case, pending
since July 2013, will bring out the truth.”
Chidambaram also took
a dig at the BJP and its role in the inordinate delay in the probe. The
criticism is not off the mark as there has been absolutely no progress in the
case after February 2014, when the UPA was in power. The CBI had, in its
chargesheet, called the encounter fake. It had named top Gujarat police
officers, including Gujarat’s director general of police P.P. Pandey and
retired officer D.G. Vanzara. Calling it a joint operation by the Intelligence
Bureau and Gujarat police, it had also named some IB officers including
its special director, Rajendra Kumar, who has since retired.
Jaising sees wider
pattern: The blatant
manipulation of the probe has also alarmed members of civil society, some
of whom have raised important questions. “Should retired officials given a
specific extension to probe, be appointed to conduct enquiries into the
functioning of the ministry? Can the rule of law be manipulated by an official
serving or retired to suit political ends?” asks noted lawyer Indira Jaising of
the Lawyers Collective. Her organisation is one of the NGOs that has faced
the government’s wrath for its dissenting voice against some of
its policies.
Jaising says, “B.K.
Prasad is the same person who had conducted the enquiry and had taken the
decision to suspend the registration of the Lawyers Collective. The strategy
adopted in the case of Lawyers Collective was the same, that is, first a
political decision is taken to fix someone and then an enquiry is conducted to justify
the political decision. I had lodged a complaint against B.K. Prasad with the
home minister and the home secretary that he was leaking false information to
the press about alleged violation of the law but no action was taken against
him. He is also the same person against whom another home ministry official
made a complaint of blackmailing.”
With its credibility
under attack, the BJP-led government will have lot of answering to do in the
next few days. But the political tug-of-war that the corrupt probe has set
off may not end soon. As Ishrat’s mother, Shamima Kausar – whose petition
triggered a quest for justice that is now in its twelfth year
– continues to wait for the truth, perhaps this latest
scandal will speed up the wheels of justice
see also
Smruti Koppikar - Maharashtra CM has no will to pursue my father’s murder
Petition in Supreme Court Accuses NIA of Soft-Pedaling Hindutva Terror Cases
After Malegaon, Ajmer Blast Case Faces Allegations of Sabotage // Witnesses turn hostile in Samjhauta case
Petition in Supreme Court Accuses NIA of Soft-Pedaling Hindutva Terror Cases
After Malegaon, Ajmer Blast Case Faces Allegations of Sabotage // Witnesses turn hostile in Samjhauta case
Retired Gujarat DIG Vanzara Demands Promotions for Encounter-Accused Cops (and threatens 'unknown consequences' in case his demands are refused).
Prajapati encounter case: Gujarat Police inspector Ashish Pandya reinstated in service
Gujarat reinstates another suspended cop after securing bail in Prajapati encounter case
DG Vanzara's letter - Times of India (2013)
Sumana Ramanan - clips of controversial Modi speeches made just after Gujarat riots (2014)
Prajapati encounter case: Gujarat Police inspector Ashish Pandya reinstated in service
Gujarat reinstates another suspended cop after securing bail in Prajapati encounter case
DG Vanzara's letter - Times of India (2013)
Sumana Ramanan - clips of controversial Modi speeches made just after Gujarat riots (2014)
RSS men attacked us, police forced us to forego legal action, say Sonepat Dalits
