Speculators in death: Modi and Ajit Kumar Doval

Since it became clearer that Ishrat Jahan and others were killed for the sake of saving Chief Minister Narendra Modi in a fake encounter on June 15, 2004 much water has flown down the river. Mufti Qayum Mansoori was acquitted along with others in the Akshardham temple attack case of September 2002. The attack on the temple was a fact but it was not the work of those whom the trial and high courts judged guilty. The Supreme Court acquitted them because it was a bogus charge leveled against the innocent for which they suffered so much in jail for nearly 13 years. Another casualty of premeditated charge against another accused was the case of Ishrat Jahan fake encounter in which two Pakistani Zeeshan Johar and Amjad Ali Rana were also killed. The two were supposed to be in a jail in Jammu and Kashmir and ATS chief DGVanzara and his team had taken the Mufti to verify their identity. The team simply visited JK as tourists and did not bother to visit the jail. Therefore the question of what role IB under its chief SK Singh and Ajit Kumar Doval who succeeded him after a month, raises concern. Rajendra Kumar and three other officers played active role in the killing. Doval’s presence in the Golden Temple in 1989 when 40 Sikh militants were killed may have been helpful in tracing some militants. But what KPS Gill did in the case of Jaswant Singh Khalra in September 1995 puts a question mark on the events. Khalra was taken away from his house and then tortured and killed and his body was thrown in a canal. The police celebrated it by enjoying a dinner party at the government guest house. His painstaking work of analyzing the remains of the Sikhs killed and keeping record of the crematorium and the amount of wood sold in burning the dead aroused the anger of the police. He was repeatedly warned and then killed. There is a hint of this kind in what Shekhar Gupta says of Ishrat Jahan fake encounter: “What we do not know is, whether it was an operation that the intelligence agencies would sometimes describe as a "controlled killing", where you use moles and plants to lure your targets into a trap and then put them away, or was it as rogue operation, driven either by a combination of paranoia and arrogance, or to please the powers that be.”[1] One thing that is known invariably is that the “antecedents” of Ishrat Jahan militates against the “intentions” of the spooks and cannot mitigate the enormity of the crime. Furthermore, it is ominous to say as Gupta does that there is need for “controlled fallout” if a fuller disclosure is made in the fake encounter of Ishrat and others. Why should Gupta say this? Is it because he has had long contact with Doval who does not care for past operation of the agency for the assured impunity? Praveen Swami also shows close contact with Doval that he could say things on his behalf like his argument that intelligence would not survive investigation if facts are made known? “I have his permission, though, to speculate that it may have involved the cold-blooded execution of a Pakistani intelligence officer, the illegal detention of terrorism suspects, torture, the smuggling of arms and explosives across India's borders, and the use of false identities. “Lawyers have numbers and words for these things: 302, 304, 364, 120B, the Arms Act, the Explosives Act. These are the laws India’s intelligence services break every single day — to defend the Republic. “To comprehend this is to comprehend why India’s intelligence services simply won’t — at least in their present form— survive the Ishrat Jahan Raza murder investigation. Ever since their inception, the Intelligence Bureau and its sister-services have functioned without any legal mandate. This means authorisation for anything they do. Every time an intelligence officer initiates a covert operation, launches agents across the border or engages in the lethal deceptions that constitute the warp and weft of spycraft, she or he breaks the law and violates the constitution.”[2] Survival of India is not at the stake of disclosure of Ishrat Jahan case or Chittisingpora case. Right to life of citizens of India is more important, be they Muslims, Sikhs or Hindus (Tulsiram Prajapati). The last case is of grave importance because the chain of command leads to Modi whose bête noir Haren Pandya was shot through his testicles by Prajapati. This personal angle of interest does not point accusing finger at the leading accused Asghar Ali. No court so far has taken a su motto action to requisition widow of Pandya who met Asghar in Visakhapatnam jail. If Doval is that sharp why did he not take more interest in the goings on in Gujarat, a sensitive border state like Manipur? Gupta’s fear that one agency would be pitted against another, as CBI a caged bird of Congress versus IB infiltrated with rightwing Hindutva or BJP. If according to S Mushriff Modi can stop IB from Gujarat for seeking truth he can now as PM order fuller details made public in the case of Ishrat Jahan. If India has remained steady after the genocide in Gujarat how can it face any upheaval in just one case? No agency can be hangdog of any political part as the motto of the central government is, truth prevails. Let truth live. Don’t kill it by not making investigation diaries of police in Ishrat Jahan case locked up in vaults of the MHA available in the court where the case is being tried. Home Minister Rajnath Singh was Chief Minister of UP when he had refused to supply intelligence on the kar sevaks’ unruly behavour on the train returning from Ayodhya in 2002. The result was the Godhra fire accident. Now under what obligation he is sitting on the intelligence gathered in the fake encounter of 2004? IB cannot be allowed to be his underdog or of anyone else’s. There is also constitutional difference. India is a working parliamentary democracy. Vice President Hamid Ansari in his R&AW chief Kaul memorial lecture wanted an oversight committee of Parliamentarians to review intelligence. In the American presidential system President Obama may order the killing of Anwar al-Awlaki. For what did the Hindu extremist Dr RP Singh wanted to burn the vice president at Hamdard University meeting? Ishrat Jahan case is not just of any ordinary operation of investigation agency but it is travesty of justice and suborning of the judicial process. Even more the members of the team had been queasy of going ahead in killing Ishrat. GL Singhal felt that the girl did not deserve killing. He even asked counter terrorism in charge ATS chief Vanzara to clarify the matter. Vanzara contacted minister for home Amit Shah (black beard) who in turn sought consent from Modi (grey beard). If the case is allowed to proceed to its logical end even the Prime Minister would be in danger. Ministry of Home Affairs’ denying permission to produce the police investigation record diaries to CBI for court scrutiny is suborning of judiciary. It is also casual “controlled killing” of Muslims who are no better than poultry in the eyes of the reigning echelon and the right wing groups in power. The agony of the victims doesn’t mean anything! Ishrat Jahan’s father was a poor migrant from Bihar living hand to mouth life in the slums of Mumbai. Before his death caused by falling from the scaffold of a building under construction he beseeched Pranesh Pillani (Javed) to have mercy and give livelihood to his daughter. She got death, instead, administered drug by Dr Narendra Amin and killed on road by Gujarat police with guns supplied by IB! ------- [1] http://archive.indianexpress.com/news/body-politics/1138181/0 [2] http://www.firstpost.com/india/ishrat-jahan-case-intelligence-wont-survive-the-investigation-939229.html