New Delhi, July 30: The Supreme Court on Friday stayed all proceedings against social activist Teesta Setalvad, who alleged that she was being harassed by Gujarat police for taking the lead in unearthing a mass grave of 2002 riot victims at Pandarwada village.
A bench of Justices Aftab Alam and R M Lodha issued notice to the Gujarat government and ordered stay of proceedings in the case after her counsel Kamini Jaiswal argued that the Gujarat High Court erred in not quashing the FIR lodged against her client in the case.
In her petition filed through advocate P Ramesh Kumar, Setalvad alleged that of the remains of the bodies found at the mass grave, DNA samples of eight matched with the relatives. Despite this, the police kept harassing her by summoning her time and again and forced her to take anticipatory bail.
She said the police’s intent to involve her in a false case came to the fore when it was learnt that in a chargesheet in the case, she was shown as an absconding accused.
“The petitioner initially wrote to the police requesting them to correct the chargesheet. As they did not change it, she was forced to file a writ petition before the high court. The HC partly allowed the petition after concluding that there were mala fides on the part of police,” she said.
“However, the HC declined to quash the FIR on the ground that such a request was not pressed by her counsel,” she said.
–Agencies