14 Gujarat cops implicated in Ishrat case seek CBI probe

 The petition comes at a time when the Gujarat High Court- appointed Special Investigation Team (SIT) had found evidence to establish that the encounter was fake.
In their petition, the officer have targeted an SIT member Satish Verma alleging that he was vindictive and the probe was hence biased.

It was Verma who in an affidavit sometime back had informed the court that evidences so far collected indicated that the encounter could have been fake. In fact  during the last hearing in the case, the court had given free hand to Verma to arrest officials if there were some solid evidences. The petition is being seen as an attempt to delay that process.

The applicants said that the way Verma has been going ahead with the investigation it seems that he had personal grudges against them or was acting on the behest of some IPS officers which was vindictive and prejudicial.

 The applicants have stated that Verma would create false evidences against them hence the court should consider their application and think of reconstituting the SIT or hand over the investigations to the Central agency.

“Right from the day Mr verma started investigation, he has been biased and wanted to implicate them in the case. That is why they have moved the application,’’ said their advocate Brajesh Limbachiya.

Hearing soon

The petition is expected to come up for hearing in a few days’ time but importantly the court did not given any relief to the officers in terms of a stay on their arrest. The counsel for the victims in the encounter case have rubbished the petition. Mukul Sinha, counsel for Gopinath Pillai whose son was also killed in the encounter, said that there was an attempt to delay the process.

“The Gujarat police which had at the time of the arrest of their home minister Amit Shah termed CBI as Congress bureau of investigation are now seeking a CBI inquiry. This is just an attempt to delay the investigation process,’’ he alleged.