CBI drops fake encounter case against Amit Shah Tuesday Dec 30,2014

 

In a major relief to Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) president Amit Shah, a special CBI court in Mumbai on Tuesday Dec 30,2014 discharged him in the fake encounter cases of Sohrabuddin Sheikh and Tulsiram Prajapati. 

Special CBI judge M.B. Gosavi found there was no direct evidence linking Shah to the murders and that the central investigative agency had named him as an accused based on inferences.

The CBI had named Shah as conspirator in the fake encounter cases when he was home minister of Gujarat. The CBI had claimed that phone call records revealed that Shah was in touch with accused officers during the ‘operation’, thus giving credence to his involvement in the conspiracy. 

The court debunked this conclusion on the grounds that there was nothing unnatural in Shah talking on the phone to his officers. 

“I am of the opinion the inference drawn by the CBI is not accepted. The entire record when considered in totality shows that there is no case against applicant Shah,” reasoned judge Gosavi while discharging Shah under Section 227 of the Criminal Procedure Code (CrPC).

The court also agreed with the defence counsel S.V. Raju’s contention that Shah was falsely implicated in the case for political motives. 

Note

Sohrabuddin, a gangster whom the Gujarat police claimed had links with Lashkar-e-Taiba, and his wife Kausar Bi, were allegedly abducted by Gujarat ATS from Hyderabad on their way to Sangli in Maharashtra. 

Sohrabuddin was killed in a fake encounter near Gandhinagar in November 2005, after which his wife disappeared and was believed to have been murdered. 

Tulsiram, an aide of the gangster and an eyewitness to the encounter, was allegedly killed by police at Chapri village in Banaskantha district in Gujarat in December 2006. 

Shah was alleged to have plotted the killings with some police officers. He was arrested by the CBI in July 2010 and granted bail by the Supreme Court three months later on October 29 on the condition that he did not enter Gujarat.

The Sohrabuddin case was transferred to Mumbai in September 2012 at the CBI’s request for fair trial. 

In 2013, the SC had clubbed Prajapati’s encounter case with that of Sohrabuddin.