The Chief Judicial Magistrate of Kutch on Wednesday permitted the Supreme-Court-appointed Special Investigation Team (SIT) probing some of the massacres during the 2002 communal riots in Gujarat, to question the suspended IAS officer of the State cadre, Pradeep Sharma, in connection with its investigation.
The SIT was likely to question Mr. Sharma in the Bhuj jail on May 24.
Permission for questioning Mr. Sharma — who was arrested in connection with an alleged land scam in Kutch when he was the District Collector in 2001 — was sought by the SIT on receiving a letter from the IAS officer last week claiming that he had information about Chief Minister Narendra Modi's anti-minority stance during the riot and would give details if summoned by the SIT.
Mr. Sharma, in an April 25 letter to SIT chairman R.K. Raghavan, had claimed that during the riots he had received a call from the Chief Minister's Office (CMO) asking him to advise his brother and IPS officer Kuldeep Sharma to “abstain from taking any pro-active measures in favour of the minorities.”
Pradeep Sharma then was posted in Jamnagar as the Municipal Commissioner while Kuldeep Sharma was the Inspector General of Police, Ahmedabad range. In his letter, Mr. Sharma had told Mr. Raghavan that he would “reveal” the name of the person in the CMO who had called him, as well as the exact nature of the conversation, if allowed to depose before the SIT.
The court, however, did not accept his bail plea in this connection but permitted the SIT to question Mr. Sharma in the Bhuj jail.
The Special Public Prosecutor (SPP) for the Dipda Darwaja massacre case in Visnagar in Mehsana district, P.R. Agarwal, has sought Mr. Raghavan's permission to retire from the case, alleging that the judge presiding over the fast-track court holding the trial in the case was not prepared to listen to his arguments.
The senior advocate and the SPP in the case and his assistant Hansa Jain wrote a letter to Mr. Raghavan stating that the judge “seemed to be in a great hurry” to conclude the trial and was cutting short his arguments without any reason. The hearing in the case, in which 11 members of the minority were killed, has reached almost the concluding stages as examinations of the witnesses were completed and the advocates were giving summations of the case.
The Dipda Darwaja advocate is the fourth SPP requesting for permission to quit the post, mostly on the grounds of “lack of co-operation” from the judges presiding over the case hearings. Earlier, the public prosecutors of Gulberg Society, Naroda Gam and the Ode massacre cases had to be changed because they prematurely bowed out of office.
