New Delhi: The Gujarat Government has opposed in the Supreme Court shifting outside the State 17 cases arising out of eight major incidents relating to the Godhra riots.

A three-judge Bench comprising Justices K.G. Balakrishnan, Lokeshwar Singh Panta and D.K. Jain was hearing petitions filed by the National Human Rights Commission, social activist Teesta Setalvad and some non-governmental organisations seeking reinvestigation by the CBI and shifting of the cases for trial outside Gujarat as was done in the Best Bakery case.

Citing the judgment in the Lalu Prasad case, Gujarat said on Wednesday: "PIL is totally foreign to pending criminal proceedings and monitoring of pending trial is a subversion of criminal law." It was clear from this judgment that once a charge sheet was filed in the competent court after completion of investigation, monitoring could not be done, said counsel Sourav Kripal. Contending that the issue of maintainability of the transfer petitions should be decided, he sought dismissal of the petitions.

Amicus curiae Harish Salve wanted the court to lay down proper guidelines on the rights of victims in a criminal case. He said larger issues such as the extent of witness protection that could be granted and whether the apex court could issue directions to the trial court bypassing the procedure contemplated under the Criminal Procedure Code were to be decided in this case.

Senior counsel K.T.S. Tulsi, appearing for the accused, said: "If a person is not satisfied with the investigation, he has to approach the trial court. Cr.PC can take care of every situation and all the issues raised by the petitioners are to be addressed only before the trial court. The procedure cannot be short-circuited. The Supreme Court cannot invent a new procedure and trial can proceed only under the established procedure."

The Bench told counsel, "under normal circumstances, what you say is right. Here the allegations are against the State. The Cr.PC is completely forgotten; FIRs not filed; wrong persons included as accused; post-mortem was not conducted on bodies, which were buried; doctors gave false evidence, etc."

It posted the cases to February 20, 2007.

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