Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) president Nitin Gadkari said on Monday that the Congress had declared war on the party by using the CBI. Reading from a prepared five-page statement at a press conference, Mr. Gadkari said, “By fabricating false and frivolous charges through its pincer, the CBI, and by arresting Amitbhai Shah, the [former] Gujarat Home Minister on that basis, the Central government has declared a hostile political war on the best performing State government in the country led by Narendra Modi. The BJP regards this as equally a war on itself.”
Mr. Gadkari questioned the credentials of Sohrabuddin, who he said was not a businessman as some reports in the media suggested but a “terrorist.” The BJP president said, “We will fight the case in court and we will get justice.”
To stress that it was the Gujarat government which was targeted, he said that the CBI did not investigate the Andhra Pradesh police officials who were equally involved in the arrest and encounter death of Sohrabuddin. “Under the UPA rule, terrorists are treated with biriyani and those patriotic police officials and their political bosses who deal with terrorists are humiliated like hardened criminals,” he said.
He called for a national policy on encounter killings which clearly spells out the norms for encounters as well as probes into them, as otherwise the officials will stop acting against terrorists even if they need to, which will put the nation at risk. However, he declined to comment on the murder of environmental activist Amit Jethwa outside a court in Gujarat recently and said that was not part of his subject today. He also distributed an article on David Headley's statement on Ishrat Jehan who was shot dead in an encounter in 2004 to prove that “Rat Jehan,” as he kept referring to her, was a Lashkar fidayeen.
He slammed the CBI for releasing the information to the media on Amit Shah in a suspicious manner. “The manner in which the CBI treated Amitbhai itself betrays its not-so-hidden intentions,” he pointed out. First, the CBI planted a news that they wanted to question Amitbhai on the Sohrabuddin encounter.
When he wrote to them saying that he was willing to meet them to answer their questions, they took a step back and did not send any summons to him. Then they began planting news items day after day saying that the arrest of Amitbhai Shah was imminent. Last week, this rumour mongering peaked.
On Sunday, Mr. Gadkari said Amitbhai Shah had gone to the CBI office and asked to be questioned; but he was not questioned – and was taken to the court where the CBI told that it was not interested in examining or interrogating him, and asked for his judicial custody. “So, it is evident that the whole story of examining Amit Shah to know his version was a farce.”
