Ishrat case: Ex-IB special director seeks copy of chargesheet

Ahmedabad: The advocate representing former Special Director of Intelligence Bureau (IB) Rajinder Kumar, an accused in the Ishrat Jahan case, on Monday said that no court could take cognisance of the chargesheet against any Central government officer if necessary sanctions are not obtained. [caption id=“attachment_1383415” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  Ishrat Jahan. IBNLive[/caption] Kumar’s counsel S V Raju told Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate H S Khutwad that under Section 197 of the Criminal Procedure Code, the Centre’s sanction has to be sought to prosecute Central government officials, which has not been granted in this case. Raju also said that without previous sanctions, no court could take cognisance of offences alleged to have been committed by public servants while discharging their official duties. Kumar who has been charged by the CBI with murder and criminal conspiracy in alleged fake encounter case of Ishrat Jahan and three others, today approached a special court, seeking a copy of the supplementary chargesheet. However, the court said that the chargesheet is in a sealed cover and is yet to be verified by it. Last week, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) in a supplementary chargesheet charged Rajinder Kumar with murder and criminal conspiracy in the 2004 encounter case, while accusing three other serving officers of criminal conspiracy as well as other offences. But it left out Amit Shah, a close aide of Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi, who was under the scanner in the case. The CBI went ahead with the chargesheet against the IB officers, despite the denial of sanction of prosecution by the Union Law Ministry, which had stated that the evidence is not enough. The court said that it would look into Kumar’s contention. Nearly a decade after Ishrat was allegedly murdered along with her friend Javed Sheikh, alias Pranesh Pillai, in Gujarat and two others, believed to be Pakistani nationals, the CBI filed a supplementary chargesheet naming Kumar, who was Joint Director of the IB, posted in Gujarat at that time. He was charged with Section 120-B (criminal conspiracy) for Section 302 (murder) and other sections of the Indian Penal Code, besides various provisions of the Arms Act. Along with Kumar, those named in the chargesheet are serving officers T Mittal, M K Sinha and Rajiv Wankhede, who have been booked for criminal conspiracy, wrongful confinement, kidnapping and wrongful concealment, besides under various sections of the Arms Act. The CBI alleged in its supplementary chargesheet, that Kumar handed over arms and ammunition to Girish Singhal of the Gujarat Police, who passed on the weapons to Deputy SP Tarun Barot through Nizamuddin Sayeed. These arms and ammunition were allegedly used to commit the crime. In its first chargesheet filed in the case on 3 July last year, the CBI had named the four IB officers, but not identified them as suspects, while terming the encounter as “fake” and “a joint operation by IB and the Gujarat Police”. IPS officers DG Vanzara, PP Pandey, Girish Singhal, besides Tarun Barot, NK Amin, JG Parmar and Anaju Chaudhary had been named as accused. The CBI had said that Ishrat and others were in the custody of the Gujarat police before being killed and, in fact, she and Javed had been interrogated by Kumar at a farmhouse on the outskirts of the city where they were kept in confinement. Allegedly, all the four were taken to the ’encounter’ spot near Kotarpur Waterworks blindfolded on June 15, 2004, before being shot dead in cold blood, the CBI had said. PTI