SIT in Ishrat case to be notified in two days - Guj. Govt

Assures High Court Following Contempt Petition

Ahmedabad: The state government on Friday assured Gujarat high court that it would issue notification in regards with constitution of a new Special Investigation Team (SIT) to probe the 2004 Ishrat Jahan encounter case.



However, the quick response from the government came only after one of the litigants, Gopinath Pillai father of Pranesh, one of those killed in the encounter, filed a contempt petition against the government. He claimed that the state government has not acted even after two months since the high court order for issuance of notification for SIT to investigate the shoot-out that had taken place on June 15, 2000.
Besides Ishrat, Pranesh alias Javed Shaikh, Amjad Ali Rana and Zeeshan Johar were killed in the operation that was carried out by the city crime branch. After the shootout, they were declared as Lashkare-Toiba operatives out to kill chief minister Narendra Modi.
The order of forming SIT comprising Delhi cop Karnail Singh, and two Gujarat cadre officers — Satish Verma and Mohan Jha came in September. The division bench set a deadline for the government to come up with the notification in this regard within two weeks. However, the government preferred an appeal in the Supreme Court against this order maintaining that the probe should be handed over to the recently announced Special Task Force to probe fake encounters.
After the SC rejected the state government’s appeal, Shaikh’s father filed a contempt petition claiming that state’s not coming out with notification for SIT within two weeks. A division bench was about to admit the case, but restrained itself after a government counsel urged the court to grant time to the government because the administration is likely to come out with the notification within two days.
A judicial inquiry conducted by metropolitan magistrate SP Tamang last year revealed that the encounter was stage managed by trigger-happy, promotion-hungry cops. The recent SIT is the third probe agency to investigate the case.