The Gujarat government today rejected the SP Tamang report which concluded that Ishrat Jahan was killed in a fake encounter and said it would challenge it in a higher court.
The Gujarat government today rejected the SP Tamang report which concluded that Ishrat Jahan and three others were killed in a fake encounter in 2004 and said it would challenge it in a higher court.
"Magistrate Tamang's report is bad in law, and he has overstepped his jurisdiction by submitting his report even before a high-level committee appointed by the high court to probe the matter could do so," Gujarat government spokesman Jaynarayan Vyas said.
"The report prepared by the magistrate is beyond the jurisdiction of section 176 CrPC (inquiry by magistrate in to cause of death) and will not stand legal scrutiny," Vyas claimed at a press conference here.
Quoting the Union Government's affidavit in the Supreme Court, he said it clearly stated that Ishrat and the other three were LeT operatives and were planning terror strikes in Gujarat.
Magistrate Tamang's report, submitted yesterday, said the encounter in which 19-year-old college student Ishrat Jahan and three others were gunned down in 2004 was fake and executed in "cold blood" by police officers for selfish motives. They were allegedly plotting to kill chief minister Narendra Modi.
The report of the investigation conducted by the magistrate had accused senior police officers of "staging" the encounter.
The four, claimed to have been felled by the police in an encounter on the outskirts of the city on June 15, 2004 were -- Ishrat, Javed Ghulam Sheikh alias Pranesh Kumar Pillai, Amjad Ali alias Rajkumar Akbar Ali Rana and Jisan Johar Abdul Gani.
Vyas said not only the state government but also the ministry of home affairs at the Centre had sworn an affidavit in the Supreme Court stating that the four were operatives of Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT).
He said as per the MHA affidavit, even a mouthpiece of LET had disclosed that Ishrat was associated with the terror outfit.
The Gujarat government spokesman contended that when an HC-appointed committee headed by an officer of the rank of additional director general of police was probing the matter, a parallel inquiry by a magistrate was not in order.
"The High Court is a superior authority and inquiry ordered by it should have prevailed. An inquiry by a superior authority should have naturally taken precedence," he contended.
Following a petition by Ishrat's mother Shameena Bano, the Gujarat High Court had last month formed a three-member committee to further investigate the 2004 encounter case.
After the Sohrabuddin fake encounter case, this is the second case in which an encounter involving Gujarat police during the tenure of Narendra Modi government has come under the scanner.
Tamang was appointed to conduct the inquiry after the district magistrate concerned had referred the case to lower court.
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