Supreme Court verdict tomorrow on Zakia Jafri's plea

She had asked for a fresh probe into the killing of Ehsan Jafri

The Supreme Court will give its verdict on Monday on a plea by Zakia Nazim Jafri for a direction to conduct further probe into the alleged role of Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi in the 2002 Gulberg Society case.

Ms. Zakia is the wife of Congress MP Ehsan Jafri, who was killed in the post-Godhra riots.

The Special Investigation Team (SIT), headed by the former CBI Director R.K. Raghavan, had submitted a report to the court on the complaint after examining Mr. Modi and others. However, as the Supreme Court felt the inferences of Mr. Raghavan in the report did not match the findings of SIT, it sought the comments of amicus curiae Raju Ramachandran to suggest a course of action.

On July 28, a three-judge Bench of Justices D.K. Jain, P. Sathasivam and Aftab Alam, perused the report of the amicus curiae, who is understood to have disagreed with certain conclusions in the SIT report and given some suggestions. While reserving orders on that day, the Bench told counsel that it would pass orders giving directions indicating the course of action. On Monday, the Bench will give its verdict on the complaint.

Acting on the complaint of Ms. Zakia Jafri that had named Mr. Modi and 62 others alleging that they orchestrated the post-Godhra riots in connivance with police officials and senior bureaucrats, the SIT conducted a probe and submitted its report to the Supreme Court in May 2010.

On March 15, 2011, the Bench pointed out that the inferences of Mr. Raghavan in the report did not match the findings of the SIT and asked it to examine the observations of the amicus curiae and consider conducting a further probe into the complaint.

The SIT, after conducting the further probe based on the comments of the amicus curiae and submitted its second report to the court on April 25. It was on this report the amicus curiae was asked to evaluate and give his comments.

The thrust of the allegation in the complaint was that there was a conspiracy involving Mr. Modi, some Ministers, senior police officers and officials to commit acts after the Godhra train fire that would provoke communal violence in the State. It was also alleged that they had conspired to render the police and security forces inactive, to aid and abet mob violence.