Zeenews Bureau
Ahmedabad: The Gujarat High Court on Thursday constituted a three-member committee to further probe the 2004 Ishrat Jahan encounter case.
According to reports, the committee will be headed by a senior police officer of the rank of IG. Besides, two other top ranking officials - a DIG and an Additional DIG – will also be a member of the high-powered committee.
Earlier on August 8, the Gujarat High Court had decided to form a team of three high ranking police officers to bring out the truth behind the encounter of Ishrat Jahan and three others that took place on June 15, 2004 near Ahmedabad airport.
The police had floated a theory that the four were on a mission to kill Chief Minister Narendra Modi.
The High Court decision comes on a petition filed by Ishrat`s mother Shamima Kausar, seeking a CBI investigation and also compensation.
The petition alleged that the four persons were killed in a staged encounter by the Ahmedabad Crime Branch. Responding to it Justice Kalpesh Jhaveri then asked the government to furnish details about the police officers of the rank of ADGP (additional director-general of police) on August 12.
During hearing of the petition, Justice Jhaveri refused to hand over the investigation to the CBI by showing some reservations. He, however, favoured a probe by a team of police officers of the rank of ADGP.
Shamima`s counsels Mukul Sinha and Shilpa Shah accepted the court`s proposal. However, they said, "There should be at least one police officer of our choice in the team."
The judge then replied, "The issue can be considered after the state government furnishes the details of the officers and their accessibility to probe the incident. The team may have three or even five officers."
The judge then instructed government counsel JM Panchal to furnish the details of the police officers on August 12.
In the early morning of June 15, 2004, a team of Detection of Crime Branch (DCB) gunned down four persons -- Javed Shaikh alias Pranesh Pillai of Mumbai, Ishrat Jahan Raza, a student from Mumbra in Thane district, and two alleged Pakistani nationals Amjad Ali Rana and Jisan Johar.
