The Hindu : National : Phone call records not available, Nanavati told

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Phone call records not available, Nanavati told

Manas Dasgupta

AHMEDABAD: Investigation into the authenticity of two compact discs containing a list of calls made by some political leaders and administrative and police officials during the 2002 communal riots in Gujarat may have reached a dead-end, with mobile phone companies expressing inability to provide five-year-old records.

The G. T. Nanavati and K. G. Shah judicial commission, probing the Godhra train carnage and the communal riots that followed, had sought the records from the Cell Force and AT&T companies, main mobile service providers in 2002. Both have since changed their nomenclature after merger. At Thursday’s sitting here, Justice Nanavati said the chief executives of the two firms informed the commission that they had disposed of old records.

The commission had sought details of the calls made to and from some 40 mobile numbers held by senior bureaucrats, police officials and some political and religious leaders from February 24 to March 7, 2002. Among the numbers shortlisted from some two million call records were those held by the personal secretaries to Chief Minister Narendra Modi, the then Minister of State for Home Gordhan Jhadafiya, and Vishwa Hindu Parishad general secretary Jaideep Patel.

The records were sought after government Pleader Arvind Pandya expressed doubts about the authenticity of the CDs submitted by a former Crime Branch official Rahul Sharma, who was assisting in the investigation into the Naroda-Patiya and Gulberg Society massacres.

Mukul Sinha, advocate for the Jansangharsha Manch which represents the riot victims, claimed that an analysis of the CDs led to reasonable doubts about the involvement of the political leaders and their collusion with some bureaucrats and police officers in the riots.

Mr. Pandya said non-availability of the records vindicated his stand that the CDs provided by Mr Sharma were not authentic.

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