Ishrat Jahan case: Won’t name Amit Shah, CBI to tell special court

NEW DELHI: The CBI is set to tell a special court in Ahmedabad that it cannot name BJP leader and former Gujarat home minister Amit Shah as an accused in the alleged 2004 fake encounter of Ishrat Jahan and three others. A top CBI official told ET that the agency will tell the Special CBI Court that it has “satisfied itself” by probing the material against Shah in the case and that the same does not qualify as “prosecutable evidence”.

The court is hearing a plea filed by Gopinath Pillai, father of Javed Sheikh, who was among those killed in the alleged fake encounter. Pillai has challenged CBI’s decision to clear Shah in the case, arguing that the agency “deliberately” ignored some of the evidence that went against Shah. “The list of evidences cited by Pillai has already been looked into by the CBI and we are convinced that the same do not constitute any prosecutable evidence,” the CBI official quoted earlier said on condition of anonymity. “We feel the matter can now be revived only if there is some fresh evidence. It will be the court’s call whether or not to arraign Shah as an accused based on this existing material.”

The court can, however, reject CBI’s argument. In the Arushi murder case, a CBI court in Ghaziabad had rejected the agency’s closure report, ordering arraignment of Arushi’s parents as accused in the trial. But the CBI’s stance will come as a relief for Shah, who is managing the BJP’s election campaign in the politically-crucial state of Uttar Pradesh. In his petition filed last month, Pillai has cited records of Shah’s phone calls with some of the accused police officers and statements given to CBI by some officers.