Different levels of the Sohrabuddin case

Delectably for thriller aficionados, the Sohrabuddin murder mystery is unfurling at several levels. At the primary level, Amit Shah — Narendra Modi’s close aide and Gujarat’s absconding junior Home Minister — has resigned and surrendered to the CBI (Central Bureau of Investigation).

He is charged with murder, kidnapping, criminal conspiracy, extortion, destroying evidence, threatening and influencing witnesses. Besides, it seems that Shah pressured officers to suspend the enquiry, took away enquiry papers apparently for scrutiny, even asked ominously for the list of witnesses whose statements were to be recorded.

Now, two police officers have offered to strengthen the CBI investigation with crucial evidence to nail the minister. Former Gujarat Deputy Superintendent of Police NK Amin, an ‘encounter’ specialist accused in the case who has been sulking in jail since 2007 while his partners in crime roamed free, wants to turn approver. And GC Raiger, former Additional DGP who looked after the CID probe into the Sohrabuddin case before the CBI took over, has become a CBI witness, offering all his insider information.

At level two of this national thriller, the BJP has swung into action to protect Shah, the finest muscleman of Modi, the finest muscleman of the BJP. It doesn’t need more skeletons tumbling out of cupboards, especially about the killing of Muslims in Gujarat. Since offense is the best defense, it has declared war on the Congress-led UPA government.

It refused to go to the Prime Minister’s lunch to plan the agenda for the monsoon session of Parliament and has been screaming ceaselessly about the Congress ‘misusing’ the CBI to target Modi. Shah, they say, is being framed because the Congress wants to stop Narendra Modi from doing his wonderful development work. And to divert attention from the UPA government’s failures — Pakistan, Maoists, Kashmir, inflation.

Unfortunately, CBI enquiries are regularly accused of bias by Opposition parties. Because the Centre routinely uses the CBI as a political tool, like state governments use the police. Of course in the Sohrabuddin case, the CBI enquiry was ordered by the
Supreme Court, but let’s ignore such awkward truths.

At level three are accusations of Shah being a big-time scamster, making crores from the likes of Ketan Parekh. And there’s the cop-criminal-neta nexus with senior IPS officers running extortion rackets. Like they did with Sohrabuddin before double-crossing him for political profit.

At level four is our memory. The same Modi who now talks of Shah’s innocence had in 2007 proudly claimed the murder. What should one do with a baddie like Sohrabuddin, he had asked at a rally. The crowd had screamed, “Kill him!” That’s just what he had done, Modi had beamed smugly, adding: “If I have done anything wrong, let the government of Sonia Gandhi hang me!”

Killing any Muslim and claiming him to be a wannabe Modi assassin — as they did with Sohrabuddin — was part of Modi’s plan to garner sympathy whenever his leadership was questioned. Significantly, Sohrabuddin was killed shortly before the BJP national executive met in December 2005, when Modi was facing dissidence.

Someone could get rich making a computer game out of this multi-level national thriller. But careful when playing it — getting too close to the truth could be lethal.