Bring all to book

The killing of Ishrat Jahan of Maharashtra and three others by the Gujarat police in an ‘encounter’ in Ahmedabad in June 2004 has attracted much public attention and controversy. The charge sheet filed by  the CBI in a court in Ahmedabad  on Wednesday  makes it clear the ‘’encounter’’ claims made by the Gujarat police were false and that the killings were premeditated, cold-blooded murders.

This is a serious indictment of the state police.  What is worse is that top officials of the state police were deeply  involved in the conspiracy, its actual  execution  and the subsequent cover-up.  The CBI charge sheet has named seven police men, including senior officers, for their role in the killings. The investigation was undertaken by the CBI under the supervision of the Gujarat high court after the state police did not, for obvious reasons, pursue it earnestly.

The charges made against the accused are chilling.  Ishrat Jahan and others were kidnapped by the police from different places, held in custody for three days, drugged, blindfolded and taken to the spot where they were shot dead. Firearms were planted near their bodies to make the pretence that they were terrorists who were planning to assassinate chief minister Narendra Modi. The charge sheet does not mention whether Ishrat Jahan was a Lashkar-e-Toiba terrorist, as was claimed by the police. But this is irrelevant as the police have no right to kill a person, whether she is a terrorist, naxalite or an anti-social element, at its will. The facts and circumstances pieced together by the CBI clearly give the lie to all claims made by the police.

There is another disconcerting revelation  in the charge sheet about the role of Intelligence Bureau officials in the conspiracy. A senior IB official posted in the state is considered to have given dubious intelligence outputs and is thought to have taken part in the operation. This is a serious charge because it is out of the remit of the IB to be involved in such a manner in a police operation. The official has not been named in the charge sheet but a supplementary charge sheet on the conspiracy aspect might make his role clear. This might raise questions about the extent of protection needed and enjoyed by intelligence officials.  Extra-judicial killings cannot be countenanced in any situation and those who perpetrated them should be brought to book. It is also wrong to take partisan political positions on them.