Sandeep Tamgadge, the chief investigating officer and superintendent of police, Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) in the Tulsiram Prajapati encounter case of 2006, informed a CBI court on Wednesday, that the current chief of the Bharatiya Janata Party and former home minister of Gujarat, Amit Shah, and three others were the principal conspirators in the case.
Mr. Tamgadge filed the chargesheet in the case and also the third supplementary in the Sohrabuddin Sheikh alleged fake encounter and said, DG Vanzara, former deputy inspector general of police of the Anti Terrorism Squad, Dinesh M.N., former superintendent of police, Udaipur, Rajkumar Pandiyan, former superintendent of police Ahmedabad, were also the principal conspirators in the case.
He said Prajapati’s encounter was part of the larger conspiracy, and it was wrong to say that the 22 accused in the case had no role in it. On being cross-examined about his claim, he said he has the evidence to back it. He said the chargesheet filed by him mentions a political-criminal-police link.
Asked who the political and criminals in this link were, he informed the court that the politicians were Mr. Shah and Home Mminister of Rajasthan, Gulabchand Kataria, while the criminals were Sohrabuddin Sheikh, Azam Khan and Tulsiram Prajapati. He further said the criminals were hired by Mr. Shah for popular builders in Ahmedabad.
He informed the court that he had collected the call detail records (CDR) of Mr. Shah, Mr. Vanzara, Mr. Dinesh, Mr. Pandiyan, Vipul Agrawal, former Gujarat IPS Officer, Srinivasa Rao, former Andhra Pradesh police inspector, Ashish Pandya, police sub- inspector, Gujarat and a few police officials from Hyderabad. He said these records prove the larger conspiracy. He also said he did not destroy the CDR and had specifically brought it to the court’s attention.
Mr. Tamgadge narrated how Prajapati was taken from Udaipur to Ahemdabad twice, on November 27, 2018 and December 12, 2018. Mr. Dinesh had constituted the escorting group for Mr. Prajapati. All the members were acting on his directions and were answerable to him as he was the Superintendent (Operations) of Udaipur, he said.
He also informed the court he had recorded the statements of Mr. Shah, Mr. Kataria and marble baron Vimal Patni in Gujarat, who are discharged in the case and were directly related to alleged encounter of Sohrabuddin Sheikh.
