Even as the Central Bureau of Investigation was said to be contemplating to move the Supreme Court, Jagruti Pandya, wife of the slain former Minister of State for Home, Haren Pandya, has filed a petition in the Gujarat High Court seeking re-investigation into her husband's murder.
The CBI, which received severe strictures from a division bench of the High Court that acquitted all the 12 accused in the Haren Pandya murder case, was reported to have received an advice from the Union Home Minister P. Chidambaram to move the Supreme Court against the High Court's acquittal.
Ms. Pandya moved the High Court seeking re-investigation into the case making the CBI and the State government as the respondents. The petition will come up for hearing on September 13.
Ms. Pandya had earlier appealed to Chief Minister Narendra Modi and the BJP veteran leader, L. K. Advani, to take the initiative for a re-investigation to “ensure justice to her.” But with no efforts from the government, Ms. Pandya herself has taken up the initiative.
Unlike most of her family members, Ms. Pandya had stayed away from making any direct allegations against Mr. Modi or Mr. Advani in connection with her husband's murder.
Her late father-in-law, Vithhalbhai Pandya, as well as her two sisters-in-law had publicly held the two leaders to be responsible for the killing claiming it to be a “political murder.”
While not ruling out the possibility of it being a “political murder,” Ms. Pandya maintained that it could be ascertained only after the “real culprits” were unearthed through a re-investigation.
Haren Pandya was murdered on March 26, 2003, when he was about to get out of his car for a morning walk in the Law Garden locality in the heart of Ahmedabad.
The High Court had overturned the judgment of the special Prevention of Terrorism Act (POTA) court which had sentenced 12 accused to various lengths of imprisonment holding them guilty of the murder
