Citizens for Justice and Peace

April 11, 2012

PRESS RELEASE

The Citizens for Justice and Peace (CJP) expresses its acute disappointment at the intentions of the SIT in filing a complete closure report in the mammoth criminal complaint dated 8.6.2006 filed by Smt Zakia Ahsan Jafri against chief minister Shri Narendra Modi and 61 others. The CJP has assisted the victim survivor and widow of the late Shri Ahsan Jafri and was also co-petitioner in SLP 1088/2008 in the Supreme Court. Though this conclusion by the SIT was not unexpected, given the SIT's postures in the Supreme Court (the Supreme Court had remarked on March 15 2011 "your inferences [to RK Raghavan Chairman] do not match the findings") we had expected the SIT to re examine and revaluate its own interpretations following the Amicus Shri Raju Ramachandran's report. Unfortunately this has not happened and now we will have to battle this closure report through a cogently drafted protest petition relying on voluminous evidence that we are convinced shows prosecutable evidence. It has been widely reported that the independent assessment made by Shri Ramachandran found, contrary to the SIT, that there was evidence to prosecute not just Shri Modi but senior policemen.

The CJP welcomes the decision of the Magistrate’s court to make available to the complainant the SIT report, along with all statements and all evidences including the Amicus Raju Ramachandran report. This is a first step to collating our arguments to contest SIT suggestion to close the investigation.

The CJP would like to take this opportunity to emphasise that while a setback, the SIT closure report by no means signals the end of the legal battle aimed at booking criminal culpability for conspiracy to commit mass murder and subvert evidence in reprisal killings in 19 districts of the state of Gujarat in 2002. Judicial interpretations of the investigating agencies assessment have still to be undertaken and the fact that the Supreme Court posited its own Amicus against the SIT appointed by it suggests some serious points of contestation. The CJP believes that however long and hard, the battle to book criminal culpability for mass crimes in Gujarat in 2002 will eventually be won.

The investigation of political crimes of the magnitude alleged in the complaint dated 8.6.2006 need the skills of a sharp investigator, the understanding of communal violence and its fallout (how it can or can't be controlled) and most of all, exceptional courage and unimpeachable integrity. A vast majority of senior bureaucrats and policemen in India -- comfortable with the record of impunity enjoyed by those in charge as also the political bosses --would like to peddle, the theory that the convulsions of 2002 in Gujarat (that claimed 2,500 innocent lives and included daylight gang rape and murder) were crimes of omission and not commission. While the SIT has bought into this mindset, the fact is that the exemplary evidence supplied by former Director General of Police, Gujarat, RB Sreekumar and DIGP Arms Unit, Rajkot, Gujarat, Rahul Sharma apart from now dismissed police officer Sanjeev Bhatt suggests to the contrary. All this and more will be relied upon by us in the protest petition to be filed by us over the next few months.

The unique complaint filed by Smt Zakia Jafri outlines evidence of the chief minister masterminding a criminal conspiracy by first allowing the bodies of the victims of the Godhra tragedy being handed to VHP general secretary Jaideep Patel, parading these in a blatant fashion, making inflammatory statements, not giving command instructions to the army (who was patrolling the streets) to proactively intervene; of not only holding a meeting where senior police officers and administrators were told not to perform their lawful and constitutional duties, but following this up with the posting of two ministers in the Gujarat state and Ahmedabad control rooms to ensure help did not reach hapless victims of reprisal killings in 19 farflung districts of the state. Following this the subversion of justice

(false truncated FIRs, saving formerly named accused etc) and defying constitutional bodies was equally serious; destroying and concealing evidence and appointing public prosecutors sympathetic to the ideology of the rioting accused, not following the NHRC and Supreme Court orders are some others. State Intelligence reports given to the chief executive of the state by then ACS Home Ashok Narayan were deliberately ignored by him as were those by former ADGP RB Sreekumar. Officers like Sreekumar and others who followed the law were penalised and those who broke the law were rewarded. For the past decade the chief minister has also held the cabinet portfolio for law and order (home).

Charges against the chief executive of the state in the complaint relate to actively planning a criminal conspiracy [Conspiracy and abetment to commit multiple offences of murder (Section 120-B, 114 r/w 302 IPC)], Furnishing false information (Section 177 IPC), Disobeying law with intent to cause injury to any person (Section 166 IPC), False statement as evidence (Section 199 IPC), Giving false information about offences committed (Section 203 IPC), Injuring and defiling place of worship (Section 295 IPC), Outraging religious belief (Section 295-A IPC), Criminal intimidation (Section 506 IPC), Obstructing public servant in discharge of duties (Section 186 IPC), Promoting enmity between peoples on grounds of religion (Section 153-A IPC), Omission to assist public servant (Section 187 IPC), Uttering words to wound religious feelings (Section 298 IPC).

The CJP would also like to point out that until 2009 when on its petition before the Supreme Court, the SIT was first appointed, key accused in the complaint PC Pandey DGP Chakravarty, then cabinet minister IK Jadeja, then minister Maya Kodnani, VHP general secretary Jaideep Patel, police officers KK Mysorewala, MK Tandon and PB Gondia and VHP/Bajrang Dal member Babu Bajrangi had not been made accused in the pending trials related to the Gulberg and Naroda Patiya incidents. Today, among those mentioned above Kodnani, Jaideep Patel, Erda, and Bajrangi are accused in the two ongoing trials.

The Smt Zakia Ahsan Jafri complaint pertains to the wider conspiracy in 19 of Gujarat's 25 districts and is not related just to the Gulberg trial as is being reported in sections of the media. Details of this battle can be accessed at www.cjponline.org and www.gujarat-riots.com

The CJP would like to list below some key articles that have appeared over the last two years that give a comprehensive picture of this intense, unique and complicated struggle.

Teesta Setalvad

Secretary

Other Trustees

I.M. Kadri Arvind Krishnaswamy Javed Akhtar

Cyrus Guzder Alyque Padamsee Anil Dharker

Nandan Maluste Javed Anand Rahul Bose

Cedric Prakash Ghulam Pesh Imam

Media Landmarks

http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/article2563188.ece?homepage=true

Amicus report lays the ground for chargesheeting Narendra Modi

New Delhi, October 23, 2011

http://ibnlive.in.com/news/another-cop-questions-modis-role-in-2002-riots/156956-3.html