Ahmedabad:
In the CBI's chargesheet on the killing of college student
Ishrat Jahan is a startling claim by a Gujarat police officer. He says he was privy to the conspiracy that led to the deaths of the 19-year-old and three others, and that DG Vanzara, one of the main accused in the case, claimed that Chief Minister
Narendra Modi and Gujarat Home Minister Amit Shah had sanctioned the encounter.
The statement by DH Goswami, who retired as a Deputy Superintendent of Police, and was with the Crime Branch in 2004 when Ishrat was killed, was made before a magistrate court in Mumbai under Section 164 of the Criminal Procedure Code, but offers no direct evidence of his allegations. When asked if the CBI will now examine the possibility of a larger political conspiracy, its chief, Ranjit Sinha, said today, "We are investigating all angles related to the case."
In 2004, DG Vanzara was one of the top bosses at the Crime Branch in Ahmedabad.
Mr Goswami claims that on June 12 2004, two days before the encounter in which Ishrat was killed, he accompanied his senior GL Singhal to the Crime Branch office in Ahmedabad between 7:30 - 8:30 pm. Mr Vanzara, he says, was discussing the plans to kill Ishrat with Rajendra Kumar, the Gujarat station chief of the Intelligence Bureau, and PP Pande, the head of the Crime Branch.
Mr Goswami says he heard Mr Kumar asking Mr Vanzara to "talk to the Chief Minister."
The next day, Mr Goswami says he visited the Crime Branch again with Mr Singhal. Mr Goswami alleges that Mr Singhal objected to the plans for the encounter but that an adamant Mr Vanzara said he had "got approval from the Chief Minister and Minister of Home."
(Read: Modi named in testimony, BJP says 'it's a political ploy')Mr Vanzara, who is in jail, and Mr Pande, who is absconding, are among the seven policemen accused of murder and destruction of evidence by the CBI. The agency has said that it is investigating the role of Mr Kumar and three other Intelligence Bureau officers in the encounter.
In its chargesheet, the CBI did not comment on whether Ishrat and her associates were terrorists planning to assassinate the chief minister, a claim cited by the policemen who shot them. The agency has also not referred to whether it believes the Chief Minister and his Home Minister were aware of the plans for the encounter.
(Read: Ishrat was suicide bomber, said Headley - Intelligence Bureau's letter in Feb)