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Applications seek summoning of Modi, Jhadafiya

Manas Dasgupta

AHMEDABAD: After a long wait, both the Jansangharsha Manch, representing the victims of the 2002 Gujarat communal riots, and the Congress, on Friday filed two sets of applications before the G.T. Nanavati and K.G. Shah judicial inquiry commission probing into the Godhra train carnage and the post-Godhra communal riots in the State, to summon Chief Minister Narendra Modi and a few others for cross-examination.

The manch advocate, Mukul Sinha, had since been long planning for the move to summon the Chief Minister, which he believed, would help unveil a number of mysteries surrounding the train carnage and the subsequent communal riots as he was at the helm of affairs then and continued to occupy the important executive post.

Dr. Sinha and the Congress advocate, Hiralal Gupta, based their applications for summoning Mr. Modi and others, including the then Minister of State for Home, Gordhan Jhadafiya, now a dissident BJP MLA, and Health Minister Ashok Bhatt, on the analysis of the two compact discs (CDs) submitted to the commission containing list of over a million mobile phone calls made to and from some important numbers during the riots in the State.

In a related development, the State government’s advocate, Arvind Pandya, told the commission that the State Crime Branch police, which was investigating into the train carnage and some of the gruesome riot incidents in Ahmedabad, including the Naroda-Patiya and Gulberg Society massacres, did not possess the original copies of the CDs said to have been obtained from two major mobile phone companies providing the services in the State.

The commission had given the State government time till September 4 to submit before it the official “analysis” of the CDs as done by the manch advocate implicating some senior government officials, the police and some prominent Sangh Parivar leaders to be actively involved in conspiring for the communal riots in the aftermath of the train carnage. Mr. Pandya, however, in a letter dated August 5 informed the commission that no such CDs existed with the government and also demanded an examination by the Forensic Science Laboratory experts to establish the originality and authenticity of the CDs claimed to have been analysed by the Manch.

On Mr. Pandya’s submission that the reported CDs did not exist with the State government, Dr. Sinha demanded that the commission direct the State government to declare the former superintendent of police CID (Crime), Rahul Sharma, a hostile witness and summon him for another cross-examination. Mr. Sharma, who during his tenure at the CID (crime) had obtained the CDs from the mobile companies, had submitted copies of the two CDs to the commission in 2004.

The commission has fixed September 3 for hearing on both the pleas.

Talking to presspersons later, Mr. Pandya charged Mr. Sharma with “negligence” and said he believed that the police officer when moved out of the CID (crime), had taken the original CDs with him and left no copies behind in the department. The manch had earlier expressed the apprehension that the original CDs might had been “deliberately destroyed” by the government as it contained “incriminating proofs” about the involvement of senior ministers, and the police and parivar leaders, including the Chief Minister.

Dr. Sinha told the commission that the analysis of the two CDs had raised serious doubts about the involvement of some senior ministers, the police and the Sangh Parivar leaders in the communal violence because of their close proximity to the sites of the major carnages.

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