The report of the investigation conducted by magistrate SP Tamang was submitted in the metropolitan court here today and comes as a setback to the Modi government.
The encounter in which college girl Ishrat Jahan and three others were gunned down in 2004 for allegedly planning to kill Chief Minister Narendra Modi was fake and executed in "cold blood" by police officers for selfish motives, a judicial probe concluded today.
The report of the investigation conducted by magistrate SP Tamang was submitted in the metropolitan court here today and comes as a setback to the Modi government.
Tamang in his report has concluded that four persons--Ishrat, Javed Ghulam Sheikh alias Pranesh Kumar Pillai, Amjad Ali alias Rajkumar Akbar Ali Rana and Jisan Johar Abdul Gani--killed in an encounter on the outskirts of the city on June 15, 2004, were not linked with Pakistan-based terror outfit Lashker-e-Toiba as claimed by the police.
Police had claimed that the four were LeT terrorists and were on a mission to kill Modi. The report said police officers and their subordinates had shot the victims in "cold blood using their service revolver".
It further said the encounter was "planned" and executed "mercilessly" by shooting the victims from "close range". Even the autopsy report said the death of the four were due to bullet injuries, it added.
The report alleged that police officers including the then city police commissioner KR Kaushik, then JCP (crime branch) P P Pande, suspended DIG DG Vanzara, then ACP G L Singhal, and ACP NK Amin had planned this encounter for their selfish motives.
The report said the motive for senior police officers was to get promotion, to secure their positions, to falsely show their work as the best, to impress upon the chief minister and get his accolades.The report said in order to achieve their goals the police officers hatched a plan and illegally detained the four from Mumbai and brought them to Ahmedabad.
It further alleged the police officers had believed that death of Muslim LeT operative in an police encounter would be easily accepted by everybody. After the killing, a judicial probe was initiated under the CrPC 176. A judicial inquiry under CrPC 176 is conducted in case ofunnatural death of a person.
Following a petition by Ishrat's mother the Gujarat High Court had last month formed a three-member committee headed by an officer of the rank of Additional Director General of Police (ADGP) to further investigate the 2004 encounter case.
After the Sohrabuddin fake encounter case, this was the second case where an encounter involving Gujarat police during the Narendra Modi rule is being probed again.
The then head of DCB D G Vanzara who is a prime accused in the Sohrabuddin fake encounter case is behind bars at present had claimed that all the four had links to LeT and they were on a mission to kill Modi.
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