Submit all documents related to Ishrat case: Court to CBI

Ahmedabad: A special court in Ahmedabad on Thursday ordered the CBI to place before it all documents related to the probe in the Ishrat Jahan alleged fake encounter case.

The court of special CBI judge J K Pandya allowed the application moved by deputy superintendent of police Tarun Barot, a key accused in the case currently out on bail and serving as deputy superintendent of police of Railways.

Barot had told the court that CBI earlier did not submit those documents to the court, which will adversely affect the case, and the court should take into account these documents for its satisfaction.

The CBI will submit papers pertaining to the case, such as those involving investigations done by the crime branch, special investigation team (SIT). The documents include forensic reports, statements of witnesses, and scientific test reports conducted on police officers involved in the case.

Barot, an accused in two alleged fake encounter cases of Ishrat Jahan and Sadiq Jamal, was listed in a charge sheet and arrested in both the cases and released on bail in June 2015.

He superannuated in 2014 while still in jail, but the government appointed him on October 13, 2016 as DSP Western Railway, Vadodara, for a year on contractual terms.

Mumbra-based college girl Ishrat, Javed Shaikh alias Pranesh Pillai, Amjadali Akbarali Rana and Zeeshan Johar were killed in an alleged encounter with Gujarat Police on the outskirts of the city on June 15, 2004.

The city crime branch had then said that those killed in the encounters were Lashker-e-Taiba (LeT) terrorists who had landed in Gujarat to kill the then chief minister Narendra Modi.

The CBI, which took over the probe from the Gujarat High Court-appointed Special Investigation Team (SIT), had filed the charge sheet in August 2013 saying that the encounter was fake and executed in the joint operation by the city crime branch and Subsidiary Intelligence Bureau.