CBI noose tightens on Shah; bail rejected
Gandhinagar/ New Delhi: Gujarat Minister Amit Shah’s anticipatory bail plea was rejected by Special CBI court judge G K Upadhaya on Friday evening. Shah had sought anticipatory bail after the CBI on Friday rejected his request to give him more time to explain evidence allegedly linking him to the 2005 killing of Sohrabuddin Sheikh allegedly in a fake encounter.
Soon after Shah's bail plea was rejected CBI sources told CNN-IBN that they would like to arrest the Gujarat Minister of State for Home as soon as possible.
Shah's lawyer Mitish Amin, who went to the CBI office in Gandhinagar after the minister was summoned twice, said he had requested the agency to give his client more time and a questionnaire. However, CBI turned down the requests and officially made him an accused in the encounter case by filing a 77-page charge-sheet against him. He has been charged with conspiracy to abduct, murder and destruction of evidence and disappearance. Fifteen people including Shah have been charged by the CBI.
Persons chargesheeted: DG Vanzara (DIG of Gujarat Police), Rajkumar Pandian (Superintendent of Police), MN Dinesh (Superintendent of Police), ML Parmar (Deputy Superintendent of Police), NH Dabhi (Police Inspector), BR Chaubey (Police Inspector), Abdul Rehman Shaikh (Police Inspector), Himanshu Singh Rajavat (Police Sub-Inspector), Shyam Singh Charan (Police Sub-Inspector) Dr NK Amin (Deputy Superintendent of Police), NV Chauhan (Police Sub-Inspector), Shri Abhay Chudasma (DCP, Ahmedabad Crime, already arrested and added by CBI), Amit Shah (Minister of State for Home, Gujarat, already added during investigation by CBI but not yet arrested), Ajay Patel (ADC Bank Chairman, added during investigation by CBI but not arrested), Yashpal Chudasma (ADC Bank Director, added during investigation by CBI but not yet arrested).
The CBI has not found adequate evidence against three accused who were earlier sent for trial. They are Ajay Parmar (ATS Police Constable, Ahmedabad) Sant Ram Sharma (ATS Police Constable, Ahmedabad) and BA Rathore (ATS Inspector Ahmedabad) The CBI, therefore, did not include them in its chargesheet. The Minister of State for Home was issued summons for his appearance before the CBI on July 22 and 23. He did not appear and hence charge sheet was filed without his examination.
"They do not think that they need to give a questionnaire to us," Amin told reporters after coming out of the CBI office.
"We are willing to cooperate but the time given to Shah was less. The way he has got the summons and was asked to come for deposition, we feel that the time was too less," Amin said.
The investigating agency questioned Shah's private secretary and has now dispatched teams to locate the Minister.
In New Delhi, BJP leader Arun Jaitley termed the summoning of Shah as "political vendetta" and alleged that CBI has become the "extended arm" of the Congress. "The timing of this is chosen for the political convenience of the Congress party," he said.
The party decided not to attend the Prime Minister's lunch for Opposition parties to protest against the CBI. "We met yesterday (Thursday) and decided not to go for the lunch which was conveyed this morning. This is to protest against the misuse of CBI in Gujarat," said Swaraj.
Shah and Sohrabuddin
Shah, Minister of State for Home, allegedly personally directed the Sohrabuddin's encounter, according to confessions made by police officials
Shah has been accused of calling up policemen involved in the killing of Sohrabuddin, who was labeled as a Lashkar-e-Toiba operative. The CBI collected the phone records of the minister to prove his role in the execution of the staged killing, it is alleged.
CNN-IBN learns the CBI agency has obtained call records which reveal that Shah was in constant touch with D G Vanzara, who was chief Gujarat's Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS) and is currently under arrest for the killings, soon after the encounter.
The ATS has been accused of killing Sohrabuddin in a staged shootout on November 26, 2005, in Ahmedabad. His wife Kauserbi has been missing ever since.
On January 12 this year, the Supreme Court ordered the CBI to register a case against the policemen from Gujarat and Rajasthan involved in Sheikh's killing.
An Indian Police Service officer, Abhay Chudasama, was arrested soon after the CBI took over the case. Chudasama, the 15th policeman to be arrested in the case, was posted as deputy commissioner of police in Ahmedabad at the time of his arrest and was earlier a member of the state ATS.
In his petition to the Supreme Court, Sheikh's brother Rubabuddin Sheikh stated that Sohrabuddin and Kauserbi were picked up by an ATS team and the Rajasthan Special Task Force on November 25, 2005, while the couple was going to Nashik from Hyderabad.
On November 28, 2005, the ATS and the STF claimed that Sohrabuddin was killed in a shootout near Ahmedabad.
The police claimed he had come to Ahmedabad with the intention of targeting senior political leaders and to engage in subversive activities.
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