Two simultaneous developments are intriguing. After prevaricating for two months over submission of the supplementary charge sheet on the Ishrat Jahan fake encounter case the CBI eventually submitted it to the court. It did not name either as accused, or as a suspect deserving questioning, Amit Shah, former Minister of State Home affairs and closest aide of Chief Minister Narendra Modi.
The Home portfolio during the relevant period was held by Modi. Simultaneously there were reports that the central government will take up the allegations of unwarranted surveillance of a lady by the Gujarat police on instructions of Amit Shah who was propitiating an unnamed “Saheb”.
It seems that surveillance was carried on even beyond the Gujarat border which falls under the jurisdiction of the central government allowing it to intervene.
It is curious how persistent the government is about pursuing the surveillance case which is comparatively trivial. After all even if hypothetically it does get proved that the Gujarat police was used to monitor the movements of a lady in order to satisfy the curiosity of Amit Shah’s Saheb, what is the big deal insofar as political damage is concerned? Do not bureaucrats frequently misuse official vehicles for domestic purposes? Such misuse of official machinery in pursuit of a personal relationship is small change in political terms.
It was the Ishrat Jahan fake encounter case that was politically lethal. Over a dozen police officers are accused and in prison charged with fake encounter crimes. The most senior among them is DG Vanzara who until his arrest was the strongest personal favourite of Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi.
During the period of these fake encounters Shah was not only MOS Home affairs but was also the prime accused in the Sohrabuddin fake encounter case. He continues to be on bail while he is currently in charge of the BJP poll campaign in Uttar Pradesh. It might be recalled that during the Gujarat assembly poll in 2007 Modi had declared that for the police to kill Sohrabuddin Sheikh they did not need Mrs. Sonia Gandhi’s permission.
The supplementary charge-sheet on the Ishrat Jahan case was filed after convicted police official DG Vanzara released a widely publicized letter to the Gujarat government. He alleged that all the policemen were wrongfully jailed because they had merely carried out the orders of their superiors. He wrote that the CBI should “arrest the policy formulators also as we, being field officers, have simply implemented the conscious policy of this government which was inspiring, guiding and monitoring our actions from very close quarters”. In that letter Vanzara went out of his way to identify Amit Shah as one most responsible for the wrongful arrest of police officers.
The CBI questioned Amit Shah after the letter was released. Shah denied to the CBI any knowledge of police activities related to the fake encounters. Records in possession of the police revealed that Shah had made 331 telephone calls to Vanzara and other police officers during the relevant period of the fake encounters under investigation.
Despite this unusually close interaction with the jailed officers Shah claimed total ignorance about police activity related to the encounters. He did admit he had made the phone calls but described all 331 of them as routine. It is surprising that a minister lauded for his efficiency should be so incompetent as to be in total ignorance about his officers planning and executing these encounters.
The Ishrat Jahan case came under a further cloud after it transpired that a meeting of senior Gujarat officials in 2011 discussed strategy to obstruct investigation in that particular fake encounter case. The officials attending that meeting included the defence lawyer of the accused as well as the acting Attorney General of the Gujarat government. In addition Chief Minister Modi’s Personal Secretary, Girish Murmu, was also present in that meeting. The conversation in that meeting was taped on two pen drives delivered to the CBI by one of the accused police officers present, GL Singhal.
Despite all this circumstantial evidence the CBI has given a clean chit to Shah and entirely omitted his name from the supplementary charge sheet. CBI officials told media that there was “no legally tenable evidence” on the basis of which Shah could be named. Clearly the CBI considers the circumstantial evidence inadequate even for further cross examination of Amit Shah by the court.
Is not the CBI controlled by the government? Of course it is. Can there be then the unthinkable view that the UPA government is actually going soft on Shah by focusing on the trivial Snoopgate scam and soft pedaling the damaging fake encounters case? If that be case, why should it happen? The answer is, why should it not happen? Should not the Congress as a quid pro quo go soft on possible misdemeanors by BJP leaders after the latter have shown such touching consideration for the Congress leadership?
Consider the BJP record on alleged excesses of Congress leaders. Throughout the current poll campaign apart from taunts and personal jibes not one BJP leader has asked hard and searching questions on the government’s role in the Robert Vadra land deal, or Suresh Kalmadi’s foreign jaunts while on bail as a CWG scam accused.
Contrast this with how Rajiv Gandhi was dragged over the coals during the Bofors affair! After the Huffington Post alleged and later retracted allegations of Mrs. Sonia Gandhi’s undeclared foreign wealth, not one BJP leader opened his mouth even though the allegation was old hat publicized earlier by the Swiss media, the Russian government, The Hindu newspaper, AG Noorani, Subramaniam Swamy and this writer.
After the Maharashtra Home Minister declared in the assembly that Mrs. Sonia Gandhi’s Political Secretary Ahmed Patel had a secret meeting with notorious money launderer Hasan Ali, there was not even a murmur by any BJP leader. After an intrepid BJP intellectual echoed the foreign account allegation against Mrs. Sonia Gandhi, LK Advani promptly wrote a letter of apology to the Congress President…
After all this surely the decent and honourable course for the Congress would be to show equal consideration for the BJP leaders. Do not both parties cooperate by enriching their leaders at the cost of the nation? In the recent Adarsh scam Modi waxed eloquently against Rahul Gandhi’s silence over the corruption of Congress leaders that was exposed. But then it came to light that a BJP leader Abhay Sincheti, based in the RSS home town of Nagpur , was also hugely involved in the scam.
One does not hear anything from BJP leaders about the Adarsh scam any more. Leaders of both parties have been caught time and again with their hands in the till. Jointly they loot the nation. It becomes difficult sometimes to determine which party is in the government and which is in the opposition. It becomes difficult sometimes to identify which party is actually governing the nation. It almost seems sometimes that India is being ruled by an invisible government.
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