Ishrat Jahan fake encounter case: CBI to file chargesheet Wednesday

The CBI will file chargesheet in the Ishrat Jahan fake encounter case on Wednesday, as per reports.

Zee Media Bureau

New Delhi: The CBI will file chargesheet in the Ishrat Jahan fake encounter case on Wednesday. The charegesheet will be filed in a special court in Ahmedabad. While Special Director Intelligence Bureau Rajinder Kumar may not be named as accused in the chargesheet as of now, his name may be mentioned in the final report with CBI claiming that Intelligence Bureau had interrogated Ishrat and three other before they were killed allegedly by Gujarat Crime Branch. In its chargesheet which will be filed before the designated CBI court in Ahmedabad, CBI is likely to seek more time under 173 CrPC to continue probe the conspiracy angle behind the fake encounter. Besides 19-year old Ishrat, Javed Shaikh alias Pranesh Pillai, Amjadali Akbarali Rana and Zeeshan Johar were killed in the encounter near Ahmedabad allegedly by a team of Crime Branch officials on June 15, 2004. "We have promised the Gujarat High Court that we will file a charge sheet on July 4 in this case and we will maintain our time limit. We will file a preliminary charge sheet," CBI Director Ranjit Sinha had told reporters on the sidelines of an Interpol conference here. CBI was entrusted with the investigations of the case by the Gujarat High Court and the agency managed to get one of the accused as an approver in the case, who named Kumar, a 1979 batch IPS officer posted as Joint Director of Intelligence Bureau in Ahmedabad at that time. The sources declined that CBI required any sanction to prosecute Kumar and said his role was being further probed in the case and that he may be called for questioning again. The senior Intelligence Bureau officer will retire on July 31. There had been speculation that the CBI would name Rajendra Kumar for allegedly playing a role in generating the intelligence input that led to the alleged staged shootout. The Union Home Ministry has maintained that its prior sanction was required by the CBI to prosecute Kumar. The ministry has also expressed doubts over "evidence" that the agency claims to have of his involvement. Mumbai college girl Ishrat Jahan, Pranesh Gopinath Pillai, Amjad Ali and Jishan Johar were killed by Gujarat Police in a shootout in 2004 in Ahmedabad. Police said they were part of a plot to assassinate Chief Minister Narendra Modi. The CBI has questioned Rajendra Kumar, who was with the IB in Gujarat when the incident took place. The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which rules Gujarat, contends that the Ishrat Jahan shootout was not "fake", and was conducted on the basis of information received from IB. It has also raised questions over the manner in which the CBI was probing the case. With PTI inputs