The Congress on Thursday said it “respectfully disagreed with the conclusions arrive at” by the Supreme Court on the Judge B.H. Loya case as it had left many questions “unanswered”, and called it a “sad letter day” in India’s history.
While the principal Opposition party called for a thorough investigation into the circumstances surrounding Loya’s death, its president, Rahul Gandhi, made a direct attack on BJP president Amit Shah, who was cleared of all charges in the alleged fake encounter of Sohrabuddin Shaikh.
Impeachment motion
“Indians are deeply intelligent. Most Indians, including those in the BJP, instinctively understand the truth about Mr. Amit Shah. The truth has its own way of catching up with people like him,” Mr. Gandhi tweeted.
Sources told The Hindu that Leader of the Opposition in the Rajya Sabha, Ghulam Nabi Azad had called a meeting on Friday of Opposition parties who had previously supported the move to bring an impeachment motion against the Chief Justice of India.
For the record, the party took a cautious stance on the issue of moving an impeachment motion. “Today, I would like to restrict my comments only to the Supreme Court verdict in the Judge Loya case,” said the Congress’s communication head, Randeep Singh Surjewala.
Arguing for a criminal investigation, he said the Maharashtra government never placed “material documents and clinching evidence” before the top court.
“Issue of criminality or lack thereof can only be decided through an investigation. There has been no investigation till date in the death of Judge Loya. No one, without an investigation, can decide whether death is natural or not. Can statements of some judges made in an administrative enquiry before a police officer be the sole yardstick for arriving at a conclusion, more so when there is suspicion being raised by available forensic evidence, opinion of experts, documents, discrepancies and statements of various witnesses given to different organisations pointing towards a possible conspiracy,” he asked.
CPI(M) stand
The CPI(M) called for an independent investigation, and argued that the issue must be taken up by a larger Bench of the top court. “All circumstantial evidence suggest that this matter must be thoroughly probed to get to the bottom of it,” CPI(M) leader Sitaram Yechury said.
(With inputs from
Sobhana K. Nair
in Hyderabad)
