Ahmedabad, Nov 21 (Agencies) : The Gujarat high court appointed Special Investigation Team (SIT) probing the controversial encounter of Ishrat Jahan and three others, on Monday told the HC that the encounter was fake and the four persons were killed by the police.
The court has told the investigating agency to lodge a fresh FIR and book the cops involved under IPC 302 for murder. With the HC direction, over two dozen cops including several IPS officials will be booked for staging a police encounter in which four persons were killed.
The three member SIT headed by Bihar cadre IPS Rajiv Ranjan Verma has stated in the report that the evidence collected by the agency during the course of investigation suggest that the encounter was staged.
The SIT has also informed the court that Ishrat and three others were killed prior to the date of encounter on June 15, 2004
A division bench of the high court is hearing the matter on the SIT report which was submitted on November 18.
The Gujarat high court on October 7 asked the Special Investigation Team (SIT), probing the encounter of Ishrat Jahan and three others, to submit its final report by November 18.
That was the second time that the court had directed the SIT to submit its final report. During the hearing on September 10, the SIT was asked to give its final report by October 7. However, the team had submitted an interim report saying investigation into the case was not yet over.
During the October 7 proceedings, Verma had said that they wanted to conduct psycho-analysis test on some of the witnesses, who have turned hostile and the Central Forensic Science Laboratory (CFSL) has given them time to conduct such a test between October 19 and 21.
Verma also told the court that they had some queries regarding the CFSL report on reconstruction of the encounter.
Ishrat (19), Javed Sheikh alias Pranesh Pillai, Amjad Ali Rana and Zeeshan Johar were allegedly killed in a police encounter here on June 15, 2004.
A team of Ahmedabad crime branch on July 15, 2004 had intercepted an Indica car and later on killed four persons in encounter. Subsequently, the police team headed by IPS DG Vanjara claimed that the four persons were associated with Pakistan-based LeT and were out on a mission to target Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi.
Ishrat a 19-year-old college girl, along with Javed Sheikh alias Pranesh Pillai, Amjad Ali Rana and Zeeshan Johar were killed in a shootout by Ahmedabad Crime Branch on June 15, 2004.
The probe in the case was supervised directly by the high court which constituted the SIT last year to investigate the genuineness of the gunfight after petitions were filed by Ishrat's mother Shamima Kausar and Gopinath Pillai, father of Pranesh, raising questions about the police version of the incident.