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Documentary on “fake encounters” screened

AHMEDABAD: A 90-minute documentary film raising questions about the controversial killings of Sohrabuddin and other youth was screened here . It highlighted the alleged role of the Gujarat police in these cases which violated human rights.

The documentary producer, Shubhradeep Chakravorty, told media persons that he waited for the polling in the Gujarat Assembly elections to be over to steer clear of any political ambitions.

“It was my small effort to bring to the people the truth behind the fake encounters and encourage more and more people to join the fight for justice,” Mr. Chakravorty, who had earlier made a documentary on the Godhra train carnage, said.

Mr. Chakravorty, who claimed that he himself had spent Rs.5.5 lakh for making the documentary, said he was not aspiring to make money.

But he would sell the film’s DVDs and rights to try to recover the money invested by him.

He said he would visit each State capital and screen the film, initially for the media. In Gujarat, he did not see any possibility of releasing the film in cinemas for commercial purposes.

Mr. S. H. Aiyer, convener of the Jansangharsha Manch, the voluntary organisation fighting for the victims of the 2002 communal riots in the State, provided the platform for Mr. Chakravorty to screen the documentary for a select group of people, including the media.

Besides the killings of Sohrabuddin and allegedly his wife, Kauserbi, the documentary covered alleged fake encounter killings of Sameer Khan Pathan, Sadiq Jamal Mehtar and four other youths, including Mumbai-based Ishrat Jahan and Javed Sheikh (originally Pranesh Pillai), who had converted to Islam to marry a Muslim girl.

It attempted to recreate the alleged fake encounters based on documents and interviews with the people closely connected with the cases, including their family members, and eyewitnesses.

Pointing out that the State government had admitted in the Supreme Court that Sohrabuddin’s case was a “fake encounter,” Mr. Chakravorty said this had serious doubts about the genuineness of the three other similar cases.

It was surprising that in all the cases, the Anti-Terrorist Squad, then headed by its former chief D. G. Vanzara — now in jail in connection with the Sohrabuddin case — had given the same alibi, of all the encounter victims being “terrorists” plotting to kill Chief Minister Narendra Modi.

But the encounter “stories” framed by the police had left so many loopholes that a closer look at them was bound to “expose” their actions as cold-blooded murders.

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Documentary on “fake encounters” screened

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