The Supreme Court on December 3 gave the Gujarat government an opportunity to file an affidavit giving reasons why an apex court-appointed committee’s report on 22 ‘fake’ police encounters, which occurred during Narendra Modi’s Chief Ministership between 2002 and 2006, should not be made available to petitioners seeking a fair and independent probe into the ‘killings’.
A Bench, led by Chief Justice of India (CJI) Ranjan Gogoi made its intention clear that it would hear the PILs, which have been pending for years in the court, adjourned from date to date.
“We have to get to this... when do we do it?” the CJI addressed the lawyers with the petition in hand, referring to the case’s long pendency in court.
Advocates Prashant Bhushan and Nitya Ramakrishnan, for petitioners B.G. Verghese and lyricist Javed Akhtar, said the committee appointed by the court and led by its former judge, Justice H.S. Bedi, had filed a report in the court earlier this year after the completion of its inquiry into the “encounter”.
“Report copy needs to be supplied,” Mr. Bhushan addressed the Bench, also comprising Justices S.K. Kaul and K.M. Joseph.
At this point, Solicitor-General Tushar Mehta intervened, saying a copy of the report should not be shared immediately. He said he had “something responsible to say.”
“Ok, say it,” the CJI told him. But Mr. Mehta said he would prefer to put it down in an affidavit.
In its order, the court recorded Mr. Mehta ’s objection, saying, “The Solicitor-General wants to submit an affidavit before the court about making available the inquiry report.”
The court stood firm and posted the next hearing on December 12 though Mr. Mehta urged it to list the case after the winter vacations in January.
In 2012, Justice Bedi replaced Justice M.B. Shah as the committee’s chairperson. The petitions had sought independent investigations by CBI/SIT, alleging fake encounters and a cover-up of killings in cold blood.
Even then the court had noted that the case has been “pending for years without any substantive orders passed.” It asked the committee to “look into all these cases thoroughly so that the truth is revealed.”
In his petition filed in 2007 in the Supreme Court, Mr. Verghese raised suspicions about the encounter deaths between 2003 and 2006. He produced on record before the court the very list that the Gujarat government had furnished to the Legislative Assembly on the details of the encounters.
List spanned a range of persons
The list, he had alleged, showed that the encounter killings spanned a range of persons that included workmen who had come in from outside the State to suspected terrorists. The ages of those killed ranged from 22 to 37. It was not clear if the families of those killed were even aware of the fate of these young persons.
“There is need to investigate this pattern and there must be a system in place to ensure that armed personnel do not easily do away with lives of citizens,” he had submitted.
Mr. Akhtar had highlighted a case involving the killing of one Sameer Khan and alleged that in all these cases the police version was invariably that the victims were terrorists from Jaish-e-Mohammed on a mission to assassinate Mr. Modi.
The court had then made it clear that the cases did not include those already under investigation by the CBI or SIT as per the Supreme Court or High Court orders. This would mean the Sohrabuddin-Kauser Bi, Tulsiram Prajapati and Ishrat Jahan cases were outside purview.
