Author: R K Ohri
Publication: Vijayvaani.com
Date: September 13, 2009
URL: http://www.vijayvaani.com/FrmPublicDisplayArticle.aspx?id=808
Recently we have been treated to a grand vaudeville show by the mainstream
media about the alleged fake encounter in which a 19 year old Muslim girl,
Ishrat Jahan, was killed five years ago, on June 15, 2004, along with three
others - Javed Ghulam Sheikh, a Malayali Hindu convert to Islam, and two Pakistanis
believed to be LeT operatives.
According to inputs received by Gujarat Police
from the Union Home Ministry (i.e., Intelligence Bureau) the quartet had been
commanded by the Pak-based Lashkar-e Tayyeba, a globally notorious terror
outfit, to assassinate some prominent Hindu leaders, e.g., Lal Krishna Advani
or Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi.
The mainstream media, especially our voluble
24x7 television channels, sensed a grand opportunity to berate and condemn
the Gujarat government after a Metropolitan Magistrate, S.P. Tamang, released
to the press on September 7, 2009, his hand-written 240 page report indicting
21 police officers for staging a false encounter to earn quick promotions.
The alleged guilty included a retired Director General of Police and a former
Ahmedabad Police Commissioner.
Curiously, while eulogising the report of
Magistrate Tamang, the media refused to examine, unwittingly or deliberately,
certain glaring infirmities, both legal and factual, in the magisterial report
(wrongly described as a 'judicial enquiry' by many analysts). Some very obvious
questions, however, demand an answer.
1. Before declaring as many as 21 police officers,
including a former Director General of Police and a former Ahmedabad Commissioner
of Police guilty of staging a fake encounter, why didn't the learned Magistrate
summon them to explain their conduct? As a Metropolitan Magistrate S P Tamang
would be aware that before declaring anyone 'guilty,' it is incumbent on a
law officer to give the person concerned an opportunity of being heard in
person. What he has done is not only bad in law, but also a flagrant violation
of the principle of natural justice.
2. It would be interesting to know how often
in his career as a Magistrate Mr. S.P. Tamang declared a person 'guilty' without
giving him an opportunity to defend himself.
3. The motives of the Magistrate should be
regarded as suspect if he has never done so previously in his career, yet
chose to indict as many as 21 police officers without hearing them, as in
this particular case.
4. Why did the learned Magistrate not take
into account the contents of a key document, namely the affidavit filed by
the Union Home Ministry on August 6, 2009, before Gujarat High Court, which
categorically stated that Ishrat Jahan, her friend Javed Sheikh alias Pranesh
Kumar Pillai, and two Pakistanis accompanying them, were terrorists belonging
to the Lashkar-e Tayyeba? Was this an accidental omission (surely a glaring
one in that case) or a deliberate attempt to conceal the truth?
5. Though the affidavit clearly stated that
the Home Ministry had credible information that the LeT was planning to assassinate
top Indian and state-level leaders, and it had asked its India-based cadre
to monitor their movements, why did Magistrate Tamang and the Indian media
opt to ignore this vital input provided by the Central Government? The Centre's
affidavit further stated that Javed Sheikh was in regular touch with LeT operators,
especially Muzamil, aka Tariq, for executing terrorist attacks in Gujarat.
He also held two passports in different names and had travelled abroad to
meet some LeT operators. It is amazing that the inquiring Magistrate as well
as the Indian media chose to ignore this assertion of the Central Government
made on oath.
6. Why did the Magistrate go out of his way
to assert in his report that the two alleged Pakistani terrorists, Amjad Ali
Rana and Zeeshan Johar, were actually Indian nationals? The Centre's affidavit
is explicit that Zeeshan Johar had infiltrated into Jammu & Kashmir from
Pak-Occupied Kashmir and then obtained a J&K I-Card, purported to have
been issued by the Tehsildar of Mahore (Udhampur district) in the name of
Abdul Ghani, showing him as a resident of village Shikari, Tehsil Mahore.
7. Why did the learned Magistrate ignore the
widely advertised fact that Lashkar's Lahore-based official mouthpiece, Ghazwa
Times, had announced on July 15, 2004, that LeT's valiant woman activist,
Ishrat Jahan, was martyred in the holy cause and that her body had been desecrated
by Gujarat Police by removing her veil while laying her on the ground along
with other martyrs? This was the most important corroboration that the persons
killed by the Gujarat Police were indeed terrorists on a dangerous mission
in the State.
8. From media reports, it appears that Magistrate
Tamang decided to go ahead with his enquiry even after learning that the Gujarat
High Court had already constituted a panel of three senior police officers
to inquire into the encounter in which Ishrat Jahan, Javed Shaikh and two
Pakistani LeT operatives were killed. What could be the motives behind this
strange decision of the learned Magistrate to bypass the High Court?
But most inexplicable and tragic has been
the casual manner in which Union Home Minister P. Chidambaram has, on foreign
soil, sought to embarrass a leader of his own country and a state government
in order to score obscure points. Worse, he has mocked at the intelligence
input from his own Ministry, which does not bode well for the morale of officers
working under testing conditions. We live in sad times.
- The author is a former Inspector General
of Police