The Hindu : National : CD copies accepted as secondary evidence

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Sunday, Oct 14, 2007
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CD copies accepted as secondary evidence

Manas Dasgupta

AHMEDABAD: The G.T. Nanavati and K.G. Shah commission, probing the Godhra train carnage and the subsequent communal riots in Gujarat in 2002, on Friday agreed to accept copies of the two compact discs containing details of phone calls of some important political leaders and government officials as secondary evidence in the absence of the original. The Commission accepted the arguments of Mukul Sinha, advocate for the Jansangharsha Manch, representing the riot victims, based on the amendment made in the Evidence Act in 2000. He said the amendment provided that the electronic material, if supported by oral testimony, could be accepted as reliable evidence if the original copies were not available.

Dr. Sinha pointed out that the crime branch police official Rahul Sharma, who submitted copies of the CDs to the Commission, orally testified that he got the copies made from the original CDs.

The advocate for the State Congress Hiralal Gupta, supporting Dr. Sinha’s contention, said Mr. Sharma had submitted the same copies to the U. C. Bannerjee Committee, which was appointed by the Railway Ministry to probe the Godhra train carnage, and it accepted them as evidence.

On Thursday, two mobile service providers informed the commission that the records of calls were not available with them for a period beyond one year and it was not possible to supply details of the calls made to and from some 40 selected numbers during February-March 2002, when major communal incidents occurred.

State government pleader Arvind Pandya earlier raised objections to the authenticity of the copies provided by Mr. Sharma. However, accepting Dr. Sinha’s arguments, Mr. Justice Nanavati said the Commission would accept the copies of the CDs as secondary evidence. The Commission agreed to allow the government pleader to take copies of the two CDs from its records to submit an analysis by October 30, but the government should not use the information in the CDs about the mobile numbers except the short-listed 40. Though Mr. Pandya did not raise any question on accepting the two CDs as secondary evidence, he later told mediapersons that the government’s objections to accepting them as authentic copies would be decided only after examining the material in the CDs.

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