Delhi Police registers FIR on missing Ishrat Jahan files case, begins probe

The Delhi Police on Sunday registered a FIR on missing Ishrat Jahan files case and has launched a probe into the matter.

New Delhi: The Delhi Police on Sunday registered a FIR on missing Ishrat Jahan files case and has launched a probe into the case. The documents had reportedly gone missing from the North Block office of the ministry of home affairs (MHA).

The FIR was launched at the Sansad Marg police station by V.K. Upadhyay, under secretary to the Government of India, under Section 409 (Criminal Breach of Trust) of IPC with the Delhi police.

Deputy Commissioner of Police Jatin Narwal told IANS, "We have filed an FIR in the Ishrat Jahan missing documents case and are planning for further proceedings."

According to the police, in March an inquiry committee led by Additional Secretary of the Home Ministry examined the Ishrat Jahan files in detail and it was found that around five documents including two affidavits were missing. 

However, Narwal said that it was too early to determine how these papers went missing from the file, or if they were removed deliberately. 

"At this stage nothing can be said. We are probing the matter," he said.

In March 2016, a team of MHA had found that around five different documents, including two affidavits, were missing. 

It was later learnt that the documents went missing during the tenure of former Union home minister P. Chidambaram. Earlier, it was decided that the probe will be handed over to the CBI, but later the MHA directed the Delhi police to probe the matter.

According to the information, two letters written by the then home secretary G.K. Pillai to the then attorney-general G.E. Vahanvati were not traceable. 

The draft of the second affidavit that came from the AG, to which the then-home minister made changes, is also missing. Later a draft affidavit sent to the attorney-general was recovered from a computer used by Pillai.

Ishrat Jahan and three others were killed in an "alleged fake encounter" near Ahmedabad in Gujarat in 2004.