Ahmedabad, August 24: The Gujarat High Court today directed the state government to get the view of the special investigation team (SIT), probing some 2002 riot cases, if it was willing to take investigate the Ishrat Jahan encounter case.
The direction was issued by a division bench of justices Jayant Patel and Abhilasha Kumari, while hearing a petition seeking review of the high court’s order transferring the probe in the Ishrat case to Supreme court-appointed SIT.
The petition was filed by Gopinath Pillai, father of Javed Ghulam Sheikh alias Pranesh Kumar Pillai who was one of the three persons killed in police encounter along with Ishrat in June 2004. Further hearing of the case is scheduled for August 31.
The court asked high court advocate general Kamal Trivedi, appearing on behalf of the state government, to obtain SIT’s view if it was willing to take up the probe in the case or not.
The court said if the SIT was not desirous of taking the work assigned to it, then it may have to take up its order for modification.
Trivedi further informed the court that following its order of August 12, SIT had made representation with the apex court and a letter containing the details of what actually transpired in the apex court would be reaching the high court soon.
Appearing for the petitioner, Mukul Sinha said his petition was independent of the fact whether SIT would probe it or not. He said that review has been sought on some legal aspects and on whether probe should be transfered to the SIT. The same division bench hearing the case today, had on August 12 ordered transfer of probe in the encounter of Ishrat and three others to SIT.
They had also rejected plea of Gopinath and Ishrat’s mother Shamima Kausar, for CBI inquiry in the case. In its order, the court had observed that there was no material on record to conclude that the encounter was with malafide intentions and, therefore, the plea for a CBI inquiry by the mother of the girl was not granted.
But it agreed that the probe done by the previous police officers was found to be not satisfactory and hence the genuineness of the encounter deserved further investigation.
Mumbai-based Ishrat was killed in an encounter along with Javed Ghulam Sheikh alias Pranesh Kumar Pillai, Amjad Ali alias Rajkumar Akbar Ali Rana and Jisan Johar Abdul Gani by crime branch officials near Ahmedabad on June 15,2004. Gujarat Police at the time of encounter claimed that Ishrat and three others were LeT operatives on a mission to kill Chief Minister Narendra Modi.
-PTI