Ahmedabad, February 05: The Mumbai CBI which is probing fake encounter of Sohrabuddin Sheikh and disappearance of his wife, on Thursday submitted the FIR copy in a local court here.
The FIR was registered on February one at the special crime branch of CBI in Mumbai, on a complaint filed by Sohrabuddin’s brother Rubabuddin Sheikh.
The suspects include police officials of the Anti Terror Squad of Gujarat and Rajasthan Special Task Force and others.
The CBI took up the case on directions of the Supreme Court which came down heavily on the Gujarat police for failing to conduct impartial investigations and attempting to “mislead” the apex court by filing conflicting Action Taken Reports (ATRs).
According to FIR, the offence committed by the accused in 2005 was “entering into criminal conspiracy for kidnapping or abducting with intent to secretly and wrongfully confine person, murder, wrongful restraint and disappearance of evidence or giving false information to screen offender.”
The team has collected case papers from Gujarat CID department which had filed chargesheet against 14 police officials including suspended DIG D G Vanzara and IPS officers Rajkumar Pandyan and Dinesh M N, sources said.
According to legal experts, FIR filed by the CBI was a fresh one and all the accused currently in jail, could be remanded into police custody for questioning.
“All the procedure that can take place after the new FIR would be followed including police remand for probing, visit to the crime scene, questioning of witnesses and others,” one of the lawyers representing the accused in the 2005 case said.
Sheikh was allegedly killed by the Gujarat police with the help of Rajasthan police claiming that he was planning to kill Chief Minister Narendra Modi in November 2005.
The apex court asked the CBI to probe if there was any “larger conspiracy” to the killings and submit the report within six months for its perusal.
Suspended DIG Vanjara and Pandiyan (both Gujarat cadre IPS officers) besides Dinesh M N (Rajasthan cadre IPS officer) are the main accused in the killing of alleged gangster Sohrabuddin Sheikh and disappearance of his wife Rubina.
Sohrabuddin’s brother Rubabuddin, who had filed a petition in the Supreme Court, had demanded CBI inquiry into the case as he doubted investigation done by Gujarat police.
CBI team has also written to the state government to provide office to the team which would carry out investigation into the case.
—-PTI