What exactly is the reason for this stubborn opposition to the appointment of Lokayukt? Was the Chief Minister resisting the appointment of Justice R A Mehta (Retd) as the Lokayukt or was he against the functioning of the Lokayukt itself? If the opposition was restricted to appointment of a particular person, it would not explain as to why the Chief Minister did not appoint a person of his own choice between November, 2003 to June, 2004, the period in which the NDA Government was in the Centre and the Gujarat Government had a Governor of their own party. But no Lokayukt was appointed and the office remained vacant for no cogent reason. In the last phase, the Learned Judge Sahai in paragraph 96 of his Judgement has observed that:

“There was no good or cogent reason available to the Chief Minister for writing letter dated 18.8.2011 for not appointing Justice (Retired) R.A.Mehta a Lokayukt, except adamantly reiterating the trite and stale allegations made earlier on 16.6.2011 which after inquiry had not been accepted the Chief Justice.”

Perhaps the real reason of the antagonism is the fact that the present Chief Minster faces very little political opposition in Gujarat and he has no desire to create a statutory opponent. Despite the fact that the existing Gujarat Lokayukt Act, 1986 is a weak piece of legislation without any teeth, yet the mere existence of a Lokayukt can be troublesome. The scheme of the Act provides that any person can make a complaint against any public functionary regarding any action that is relatable to corruption or any action that lacks integrity. The definition of ‘public functionary’ includes the Chief Minister as well all his Minsters. In view of these provisions, the Lokayukt Act has the potential of throwing allegations against the Chief Minster and scoring political brownies.

The worst scenario ofcourse is when a strong person with high degree of integrity like Justice R A Mehta is appointed to the office of Lokayukt. A situation like Karnataka may arise; what the entire opposition of Karnataka could not do, the report of Justice Hegde did. It resulted in the exit of Yedurappa ! If we take the recent verdict of the court directing Essar to pay over 9000 crores as tax to the Gujarat Government, one can imagine what type of concessions are being given to the rich and an inquiry into one such case by the Lokayukt can set the political pot boiling.

With the 2012 elections to the Gujarat assembly round the corner, it is unthinkable that the Gujarat Government would risk the appointment of any person as the Lokayukt let alone Justice R A Mehta. True, the judgment of the learned Judge Shri Sahai is of high degree of reasoning and erudition but the path of justice is long and arduous. The judgment is perhaps already before the Apex Court and no one can really predict when the legal journey would be over.

Appointment of Commissions to “look into” allegations of corruption may be a much safer bet. Delay is the best game plan irrespective of whether the allegations are related to riot matters, encounter issues or appointment of Lokayukt. The decade long pendency of the Nanavati commission has establish this point. Corruption is a congenital defect of the capitalist mode of production. Globalisation has only metastasized it in every organ of the State. The political masters are the beneficiary of this spread. Good governance will thus always be the victim.

Shahid Azmi, a 32 year young lawyer based in Mumbai, was shot dead by some ‘unidentified’ persons at his office on 11th February 2010. According to his close friends, Shahid was not just another advocate who practiced law to earn his livelihood. He was fighting many terror related cases, including for those falsely accused in the Malegaon blasts.

The lecture will be chaired by noted scholar, Prof. Jairus Banaji, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London. The other speakers for the occasion are: Ajit Sahi, Senior Journalist, Advocate Mihir Desai, Mumbai High Court, Maulana Ghulzar Azmi, Secretary, Jamiat Ulama Legal Cell, Maharashtra and Arif Azmi, eldest brother of Shahid Azmi.

The order came less than two weeks after the court-appointed special investigation team (SIT) concluded the trio were shot dead before June 15, 2004 — the day the police had claimed the trio were killed in a gunfight.

The police had claimed they were Lashkar-e-Toiba operatives on a mission to assassinate Narendra Modi.

Today, the court asked SIT chairman R.R. Verma to file a fresh FIR within two weeks against the accused policemen and hand over the report to the CBI.

The central agency has been directed to form a team that should be headed by an officer of the rank of DIG. The team can seek the assistance of SIT member Satish Verma, who had told the court in an affidavit this January, long before the team’s report on November 18, that the encounter was staged.

Ishrat’s family had favoured a probe by the SIT itself or by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) but the court held that the investigation “is beyond the charter of the NIA” as the SIT’s report had confirmed it wasn’t a terror case.

But eventually, the family expressed satisfaction with the outcome. “We are happy with the CBI. This judgment is very good. The CBI has been told to approach the court in case there was any interference from any side,” said I.H. Saiyed, the advocate for Ishrat’s mother.

Rauf Lala, the uncle of the 19-year-old Mumbai college girl, also believes the truth would come out now.

“We are not just hopeful but absolutely confident that the real culprit and mastermind behind the murders will be known after the fresh FIR is registered. We will know the motive, why they killed Ishrat. We will also know the faces of those black sheep in Maharashtra police who helped Gujarat police carry out such horrendous crime.”

The families of the other three victims also welcomed the order. One of them was Mukul Sinha, who represented the father of Pranesh Pillai, among the three others killed. Sinha had initially opposed the CBI probe on the ground that it would “unnecessarily politicise the issue” and wanted the SIT itself to be given the probe.

Sinha was particularly pleased with the court asking the CBI to take the help of SIT member Verma, whose inclusion in the SIT was opposed by the Narendra Modi government.

Twenty-one officers are accused in the case. These including the now-retired K.R. Kaushik, who was then Ahmedabad police commissioner, and the current additional director-general of police P.P. Pandey. He had overseen the encounter as joint commissioner.

Two other accused, deputy inspector-general D.G. Vanzara and deputy superintendent N.K. Amin, are already in jail in the Sohrabuddin Sheikh fake encounter case.

This is fourth fake encounter the CBI has been asked to investigate in Gujarat. It is probing the Sohrabuddin and Tulsi Prajapati cases, both handed over by the Supreme Court. The third, about the 2003 killing of alleged criminal Sadiq Jamal, was given by the high court in June this year.

This could spell trouble not only for the Gujarat police officers, but also for the central intelligence agencies as they are believed to have faked inputs that led to the encounter and open Narendra Modi’s government to the charge of shielding officers involved.

“Three senior IPS officers, nominated by the Centre, refused to head the Ishrat SIT,” said advocate Mukul Sinha who is representing the family of one of the victims. “This is clearly to save the skin of senior central IB officials involved in the case.”

This is the third shootout by Gujarat police that has turned out to be fake – the first two were of Sohrabuddin Sheikh and his accomplice Tulsiram Prajapati, while a fourth encounter of Sadiq Jamal Mehtar is under investigation by CBI. All of them were declared terrorists and killed by the same set of cops led by now-jailed deputy inspector general D G Vanzara.

Sinha also alleged that the encounters were staged for political gains as they helped Modi give the impression of being the toughest fighter against terrorism.

As many as 21 policemen, including IPS officers, are involved in the encounter. Among the IPS officers are the then Ahmedabad joint police commissioner (crime branch) P P Pande, then assistant commissioners of police G L Singhal and N K Amin besides Vanzara, who along with Amin is accused of murdering Sohrabuddin and his wife Kausar Bi.

Ishrat, a 19-year-old student of Khalsa College in Mumbai, and three others – Javed Sheikh alias Pranesh Pillai, Amjad Ali Rana and Zeeshan Johar – were proclaimed Lashkar-e-Taiba terrorists on a fidayeen mission to kill Modi when they were killed on June 15, 2004.The three members of SIT probing Ishrat’s encounter comprised additional director general of police (ADGP) of CISF R R Verma, ADGP of Gujarat police Mohan Jhaand inspector general of Gujarat police Satish Verma.

After the verdict, Ishrat’s mother Shamima Kausar demanded capital punishment for her daughter’s killers and blamed the officers for forcing the family to live with the stigma of having terrorist kin.

In 2009, magistrate S P Tamang had investigated into the encounter and declared it as fake. He had held 21 police officers, including former DGP K R Kaushik, ADGP P P Pande, D G Vanzara and other crime branch officers responsible for the “cold-blooded murder”.

Banking on the SIT’s report submitted last week, a bench of Justices Jayant Patel and Abhilasha Kumari asked for a separate FIR to be filed against all the named police officers. During the hearing on Monday, the judges repeatedly mentioned that another probe was needed to find out the motive behind the murders.

They observed that the date, venue and time of the encounter, mentioned by the crime branch in its FIR on the day of the killing, did not match with other investigations. The bench noted though that not all officials shown in the FIR may be involved in the encounter. “Somebody else may also be behind the encounter,” the court observed while discussing the need for further investigations.

The judges wanted the SIT to continue with the investigation, for “it is well-versed with the case”. The court also considered options of central agencies like CBI and NIA for further probe and sought opinions of all parties involved in litigation. The court has fixed Wednesday for further proceedings, when the Centre is supposed to inform the court whether it is ready to spare the SIT chairman for further probe and to extend infrastructural support to SIT. The same query has been put forth to the Gujarat government in relation to Verma and Jha.

A bench of acting chief justice Bhaskar Bhattacharya and justice J B Pardiwala asked the government to explain the issue on the basis of a PIL filed by the convener of civic rights organization Jan Sangharsh Manch, Shamshad Pathan.
A government resolution was passed on May 3 amending the rules of Gujarat Secondary and Higher Secondary Certification Examination. With the new rules, during exams, students of Standard X in mediums like Urdu, Sindhi, Marathi, Tamil, Telugu, Oriya etc. will be given question papers in English/Hindi/Gujarati only. The students can answer the paper in their own respective languages.

For students of Standard XII with regional languages as their medium, the schools will be providing question papers in English/Hindi/Gujarati, and students will also be required to answer the papers in only these three languages and not in the medium, they are taught.

On July 11, the education secretary intimated schools that they should be conducting exams in 2012 as per the amended rules. Many schools made representations against this in August, but the government did not reply. This led JSM to move the HC, where the petitioner’s advocate Mukul Sinha contended that the state government’s decision was not only arbitrary and violative of constitutional provisions, but it would severely affect students’ career.

The petitioner highlighted that in Ahmedabad alone there are seven Urdu medium and five Sindhi medium schools offering higher education. He contended that there are hundreds of students, who study in languages in Gujarat apart from Gujarati, Hindi or English. Advocate Sinha argued that it is impossible for a student to comprehend and write examination in subjects like mathematics and science in a language that is not his medium of learning.

After hearing the petitioner, the bench observed that it would be “gross injustice” to students, if such rules are made and implemented in such a short deadline. The bench asked the government to explain the issue next Thursday.

Victims of the 2002 Gujarat riots staged a demonstration on Sunday against the murder ofNadeem Saiyed, a key witness in the Naroda Patiya massacre case. They were joined by other witnesses at the protest in Juhapura.

Nadeem was stabbed to death by four attackers at the Juhapura crossroads early on Saturday. His death is not likely to have any impact on the ongoing trial, as he had already deposed before the trial court and been cross examined. But Shamshad Pathan, counsel for the Jansangharsh Manch which represents the victims, said as the special investigation team is yet to submit its final report, a situation may arise where he needs to be cross-examined.

Nadeem, a former Congressman who ran a mobile repair shop in Ahmedabad, had come across a phone belonging to Ashok Sindhi, the prime accused in the case. He had handed over the phone to the police and was eventually made a key witness in the case.

He had also busted several illegal slaughterhouses in the area.

Recently, the butcher mafia had torched a police van in Juhapura when the cops went looking for cows and several people were picked up. Nadeem had reportedly told the police that those arrested were innocent, blaming Kalu Gardan and his accomplices – part of the mafia – instead. It is alleged that Kalu Gardan and his men murdered Nadeem.

In his own case, Nadeem had been threatened in July this year by Kalupur don Mehboob Senior to withdraw himself from Naroda-Patiya case. The slain activist had even filed a complaint at Gujarat University police station.

Imtiyaz Kureshi, a witness in Naroda Gam case, was once threatened by one Dr Prahlad Parmar, who had claimed that he was the right-hand man of suspended and jailed IPS officer DG Vanzara. “Parmar had approached me as I ran a printing business. When he called me to his clinic for paying me the bill for the work I had done for him, he first tried to lure me with money for not giving deposition in the court. When I refused to do so, he threatened me and said that he managed all money of DG Vanzara and if I did not obey his words, I will have to face dire consequences,” Kureshi said.

Kureshi had also filed a police complaint on September 26, 2009 against the doctor for threatening him. But according to him, there was no significant development in the case.

Similarly, Salim Sheikh, a witness in Naroda-Patiya case, had to face harassment. Sheikh had filed an application in the SIT. “Relatives of the accused had filed a wrong police complaint against me and put pressure on my brother Sattar, also a witness. However, in the court proceedings, I was proven innocent,” he said.

Sheikh has been provided police protection, but only for 10 hours. “As per the Supreme Court order, the witnesses should be given 24-hour police protection, but my family has been given police protection only for 10 hours. If Nadeembhai had policemen with him, he wouldn’t have been killed. I am also facing threat to life. One day, a policeman who was deployed for my security said that enmity with police would prove costly for me, as SIT would not last long. I filed a police complaint against that constable,” he said.

Jan Sangharsh Manch founder and advocate Mukul Sinha, who is representing the riot victims in court, said the manner in which Nadeem was killed sent out a message to other witnesses. “He was killed despite having police protection. This gives out a message that if Nadeem can meet with this fate, others too can be treated like this,” said Sinha.

Detection of Crime Branch (DCB) officers said they suspect that local butcher and goon Kalu Gardan could be behind the murder as Saiyed had given some information to police in connection with the burning of a police vehicle on October 24, in which Gardan’s close aide, Murshid Ahmed, is suspected to be involved.

Mushir, along with his aide Firdaus, fled the city reportedly after Saiyed’s murder on Saturday morning.

While the police have not yet probed the riots angle, lawyer Mukul Sinha has given an application to the DCB that Saiyed had sent him an SMS for “an urgent discussion on the Naroda Patiya case” on Friday morning, but he was out of Ahmedabad. He contacted Sinha again in the afternoon and the latter asked him to meet him on Saturday, the day he was killed.

Sinha’s application has risen doubts about threats to Saiyed after his deposition to the Special Investigation Team (SIT) on riots. DCB officers, however, said that Sinha met them only to inform that Saiyed had called him a day before his murder.

“He had come only to made a representation and ‘clarify’ about the call and SMS. He has not given any application to us. We are not probing on that angle (of riots) as of now,” said a police senior officer.

Earlier, Saiyed had written to the then Ahmedabad Commissioner of Police, Sudhir Sinha, that he was threatened by Mehboob Senior, a land mafia, against giving statements against Ashok Sindhi in the court proceedings of the riots cases. He had reportedly sought help from the SIT.

Ambrish Patel, General Secretary, Gujarat Federation of Trade Unions (GFTU), and legal representatives of the GISF jawans’ union, said, “At around 11pm on Tuesday, we sent a fax request to the Governor and requested her to instruct the state Chief Secretary and ACS, Home, to intervene to resolve our grievances as even after 10 days of strike the government is not responding. We have informed her that this issue is not only affecting the jawans but also the state’s security system. On Wednesday, we came to know that the Governor wrote to the state government to respond to the issue. We hope that after her intervention government will do something.”

“Today we have again submitted a memorandum to the State Labour Commissioner and requested him to act statutorily for the GISF society as an employer to resolve the strike. As per the statutory provision, the state Labour Commissioner is bound to take action immediately when the employees of any organisation are on legal strike. He has assured us to take required action. However, so far no action have been taken by him,.” he added.

The GISF guards, who protect vital installations like Secretariat, Sardar Sarovar Dam, Civil hospitals, GIDC estates etc., have called an indefinite strike demanding revision of minimum wages and other benefits after their talks failed with the state Home Secretary Manoj Antani (IPS), who is also Chairperson of the GISF society.

Source: Indian Express