Thaindian News

Gandhinagar, April 8 (IANS) The Gujarat government is hampering probe by the Special Investigation Team (SIT) into alleged staged shootout of Ishrat Jahan, the high court said Friday.

The division bench of Justice Jayant Patel and Justice Abhilasha Kumari pulled up the government, saying that its approach seems to be to see that the SIT does not function, or if it does, then in a paralysed manner.

Ishrat Jahan, Pranesh Pillai, Amjad Ali Rana and Zeeshan Johar were killed on the outskirts of Ahmedabad in June 2004 by the city crime branch officers. The police had termed them as Lashkar-e-Taiba operatives on a mission to kill Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi.

Speaking on behalf of the bench, Justice Patel said such an approach cannot be accepted. “It seems that every attempt is being made to hinder the probe in the case,” he told Advocate General Kamal Trivedi.

The court said a member of SIT, Satish Verma, who tried to carry forward the investigation on clues gathered by him, was slapped with a complaint by another member, Mohan Jha.

Pulling up the SIT for its poor progress, the court said, “The progress report submitted is not to the expectation of the court.”

The court further directed the SIT to file a fresh report.

On transfer of Karnail Singh, chairman of SIT, court said, “We want that the investigation of the SIT should not be hampered or affected in any manner.” Singh was transferred to Mizoram.

The court said it should not be compelled to transfer the probe to a central agency such as the Central Bureau of investigation (CBI) or the National Intelligence Agency (NIA).

The court had appointed the SIT in the case comprising Singh, Jha and Verma. Singh has now been transferred and is believed to be unavailable for the probe for all practical purposes.

The court handed over the probe to the SIT to investigate the case following allegations that policemen gunned down Ishrat Jahan and others in a fake gunbattle.