(Pervez Bari): The Social Democratic Party of India, (SDPI), has expressed deep shock and dismay over the Batla House shootout case verdict wherein a Delhi court has found accused Shahzad Ahmad guilty on charges of murder of Inspector MC Sharma, who led a raid on a flat in the area where terror suspects were present. The SDPI reiterated its stand that the Batla House encounter was fake and still demanded for a high level judicial enquiry into the incident.
SDPI national president Mr. A. Sayeed in a statement lamented that the Additional Sessions Judge Rajender Kumar Shastri in his judgement took no cognizance of the questions raised about the genuineness of the encounter and the court relied heavily on the police version alone while most of legal procedure were given a go by. He pointed out that the “input” for Batla House came from the same infamous IB special director who provided the fake inputs that were used for 17 fake encounters in Gujarat which are being probed now.
Mr. Sayeed said the demand for judicial inquiry into the matter by hordes of human right activists and others was rejected by the Union and state governments saying that such an inquiry will demoralise Delhi Police. It meant that the government already believed that the boys were terrorist and conviction of Shahzad as such was a foregone conclusion, he added.
He said that the approval of genuineness of the encounter was stamped by a Delhi High Court order after on its instructions the National Human Rights Commission, (NHRC), in its findings found the encounter to be genuine. Here it should be noted that NHRC, without calling any of the parties in the know of things, especially the human rights activists and general public of the locality of Batla House where the shootout took place, relied on police version to give the genuineness certificate to the fake encounter.
He pointed out blatant flaw in police argument that Shahzad after firing at Inspector Sharma and accompanying police party fled jumping the balcony of four-storey building. It is here pertinent to mention as how can a person jumping a four-storey building survive without breaking his limbs to run away. That the L-18 flat in Batla House area, the venue of said shootout, has only one exit which was manned by police people and as such the accused could not hoodwink them to make good his escape. Also there is no such structure on the back side of the said building which Delhi Police claimed was used by the accused to escape the L-18 flat in the four-storeyed building.
He welcomed that the court has found no evidence to prove that Shahzad had any link with Indian Mujahedeen, a fictitious outfit created by IB and other investigating agencies, or any other terror outfit. The Additional Sessions Judge seemed to have agreed to this as the prosecution failed to provide any clinching evidence. The judge noted, “True, there is no evidence on record to establish that fact”.
Mr. Sayeed said the counsel for the accused had argued that as per ballistic reports the bullets found in Sharma’s body did not match the weapon that was recovered from Shahzad. The bullets matched with the gun seized from the spot and not from the weapon allegedly used by Shahzad to shoot at the slain inspector. The counsel also argued that none of the witnesses had given any description of the occupants of the flat where the encounter took place. All these facts have been ignored by the presiding judge while delivering his judgement, he said.
Another moot point to be noted is that generally an accused after committing heinous crime does not run from the scene of the crime to his home to hide himself from the investigating agencies and save himself from being arrested by police but remains holed up in some obscure place. It is to be noted that Shahzad had told the Additional Sessions Judge that was picked up by the ATS Lucknow from his house in Azamgarh and that his family had also lodged a complaint for kidnapping. He had denied that he was in the flat at the time of the encounter or that he fired on police, the statement stated.
The statement said that the photos of dead bodies of Mohammad Atif and Mohammad Sajid, the two suspected terrorists, showed that they were killed point-blank in cold blood. Sajid had got bullets in the upper part of his head- it showed as if he was made to sit down and bullets were pumped into his head. Besides, the two had injuries marks also on their bodies. As proof the post-mortem reports of Atif and Sajid as well as the photos of their bodies taken at the time of funeral are available. Moreover, civil activists believe inspector Sharma was killed in inter-departmental rivalry of police. They said, and photo proves it, he was walking on his feet when he was being taken to hospital.
Mr. Sayeed said the country needs to know the true, full story. Were these real terrorists? If so, who were behind them? Who provided them local shelter and weapons? How did they hide all this in a crowded locality living cheek by jowl with neighbours? Have their deaths and incarcerations been based on flawed information and evidence? Also, what legal or constitutional sanction do ‘encounter’ specialists have? These are serious questions that need to be asked and answered. As such the demand of the judicial enquiry is still valid which would not only bring us closer to the truth but it would also provide a balm to many, he added. (pervezbari@eth.net)