by RVS Mani
17 http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/uttar-pradesh-ats-arrests-suspectedterrorists/article18152357.ece
https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/in-raids-across-3-states-up-cops-bustlet-funding-ring/articleshow/63457859.cms
Sometime ago, a report was received that there was the possibility of poisoning of water supply to a scientists’ colony in a security establishment in Bhatkal. The input was shared with security agencies of the concerned State. The Director General of Police of the State, R Srikumar who later on went on to become a statutory functionary as the Vigilance Commissioner with the Central Vigilance Commission, led the initiative to prevent the attack. Very few know about this success story.
Another excellent success story which never got reported is about a report regarding an attempt to cause disturbance in a very historical and prominent mosque, Jama Masjid Delhi, and to create a communal cauldron in the country, this was before 2010.
The local police were informed. A possible attack of a huge magnitude was averted. This apart, the attack had the potential of creating communal disturbances across the country. I congratulate the local police, especially the Inspector Generallevel officer who led the initiative to preempt this attack.
The reason I want to highlight this is that the designs from Pakistan and PoK do not always target the general populace, the general public in India. They also specifically target Muslims to create a sense of disaffection against their non-Muslim compatriots.
We have to see each incident of this kind in the larger perspective—that the location of the Mosque is surrounded by dense population as well as it is a place of dense traffic with immense parking problems. According to inputs received by the MHA, terrorists had planned to block even the entry/exit to the place of worship by parking vehicles haphazardly and create panic among the faithful on the day of Eid. Then their agents were to provoke the people trapped inside, stating that it was a plan to target those who had assembled there. The place is a very pious place for the believers. Hence the instigation would have had the desired effect.
One important factor has to be stated here. A scheme for compensation for victims of terrorism and communal disturbances had just then been announced.. The event would have been a double bonanza for many middle men and selfstyled leaders. May be they were salivating at the prospect of a cut from the victims’ compensation.
But the larger question is who is a victim of terror attack? Do the casualties reported and their survivors, the injured only constitute the victim of terror attacks?
Are the security forces who suffer while preempting such attacks not victims? Is Tukaram Omble not one?
Needless to say, there are many others who suffer. Not on the field, but in many other ways. In their desire to serve the nation, to serve humanity, these people suffer. Take the case of Rajinder Kumar and his team members from SIB, Ahmedabad at the time of the Ishrat Jahan crossfire. Or the several police officers of Gujarat—the N K Amins, the Barots etc. Is Col Shrikant Purohit not a victim of terrorism? I have myself been a victim. I have lost my parents when yet some years were left in them, they died worrying about my safety. Am I not a victim of terrorism?
During the years 2008 to 2009, we had also to deal with law & order problems caused on account of the Maharashtra Navanirman Sena’s hostility towards migrants from certain parts of India. Close monitoring was launched in order to safeguard the life and property of the victim groups.
The real time problems need to be put in proper perspective here. Here the governments, both at the Centre and the State, were trying to control and safeguard the situation. At the same time, we had the Bihari politician Lalu Prasad, whose people were the target of MNS ire. Lalu Prasad aggravated the problem by announcing that he would perform Chaat Puja in Mumbai. No political leader would counsel him. The amount of resources that had to be deployed in securing the State and keeping the situation under control after his announcement was another challenge.
Security funding
When the resource deployment on security is concerned, there is a general thinking amongst citizens, and particularly amongst the political class, that it’s all being done by the government. Little does any one realise that the resource availability is finite.
In the same period, we were also confronted with challenging situation on the borders of Haryana and Rajasthan. An ethnic group known as Gujjars was agitating for extension of reservation to them. Internal Security Division’s domain is not to go into the merits of their plea. The Gujjar agitation had crippled the border areas. The movement of goods and traffic had come to a halt. Train movements had been halted. If I recall correctly, some of the agitators had camped on the main Delhi-Mumbai rail route. We were very close to deploying the Army for clearing the rail tracks of these agitators. It was one challenge which exposed me to the legal provisions regarding deployment of the Army in such contingent situations.
The Godhra case and other matters
As I have said earlier, 2009 was a relatively comfortable year for us in the Internal Security Division. We were generally going through the motions of monitoring, examining inputs from various agencies. Even going through the motions in the IS Division was quite a challenging task, what with the Control Room under my oversight.
The officers of the Control Room every day dished out the latest security contingencies from all over the country. This could relate to skirmish in the North East, a disturbance in J&K, a problem in Naxal-affected areas or even a communal disturbance. The menu in a vast land like India with its infinite complexities was varied.
It was for the respective functional Divisions to calibrate and respond but the MHA IS Division was involved because of the oversight of the Control Room. That year, we had also convened two Chief Minister’s Conferences, one on 7.1.2009 and another on 17.7.2009.
The first one was a political statement by the then Home Minister. I was mostly away on a task in Karnataka and had little involvement in it. Also based on the reports/record of the proceedings it seemed to be an exercise in reinventing the wheel.
In the meanwhile, I got involved in the case filed by Sardarji Maghanji Vaghela who was a kin of a victim of the 2002 Godhra train burning. At this time, I also got to know some salient facts which are part of the first-level investigation.
It transpired that in the Aman Guest House opposite to the Godhra Railway Station, owned by one Haji Sahib who got acquitted in the case, 140 litres of petrol had been stored for carrying out this carnage. The relief petition was in the Gujarat High Court. The petitioner sought justice for the victims of terrorism and also prosecution of perpetrators under the then POTA. From the Internal Security Division, I had been asked to deal with this case.
In this context, it came to my knowledge that while repealing POTA and incorporating some of its provisions in the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, amended in 2004, some saving clause in POTA had been used to constitute several POTA Review Committees for several States.
One such committee was constituted for going into cases relating the State of Gujarat on 2.11.2004. This panel gave a clean chit to some of the perpetrators of the Godhra carnage.
As I told you earlier, the case had come up first on 27.1.2009 before the Gujarat High Court, soon after I was intimidated on a cold winter night. I went to Ahmedabad on 23.1.2009, got a draft of the Union of India’ s position done in consultation with Hriday Buch, who was standing in for ASG Raval, at Ahmedabad.
Some facts as brought to my knowledge from records while handling this case is recalled below:
…that while supporting the case of the petitioner, the State
Government has chosen to read the statements of few of the
witnesses which finds place in the paper book at pages 278,
225 to 235 (Jabir Binyamin page 278, Shaukat @ Bano page
227, Salim @ Salman page 229/235).
…the material collected during the course of investigation
is taken at its face value, it reveals t
hat Sabarmati Express
reached Godhra on 28.02.2002 at 7.43 A.M. It had 18
coaches as it is borne out from the statement of on duty
Guard Shri Satyanarayan Verma. Out of the said 18
coaches, there were 10 reserved coaches, 6 general coaches
and 2 coaches were SAR. Further, as is borne out from the
statement of “A Cabin employee Shri Rajendra Meena, the
train halted at Godhra Railway Station upto 7.48 A.M.
After the train started, there was a first chain pulling . In
minutes the train again started and then there was second
chain pulling at about 8.00 A.M. Statement further reveals
that the Fire Fighter reached at about 9.00 to 9.15 A.M.
Then the train was taken to the Yard and two coaches were
separated. Again the train was brought to Platform No.10
and after the passengers re-boarded the train, it departed at
about 12.45 A.M. with the passengers.
I do not want to comment on the merits of the case which has stood judicial scrutiny. But the intent of the government through this entire compensation exercise was to give some sort of amnesty to those accused under POTA during the previous regime, whether it was the Godhra carnage or Ghatkoper, Mulund, Vile Parle, Bombay Central where the perpetators were Saquib Nachan (ex SIMI leader) or Atif Nasir Mullah. Incidentally, I filed counter-affidavits in these cases also in the Bombay High Court in August 2009 and January 2010.
Further, during the High Court proceedings in the GodhraVaghela case in the Gujarat High Court on 1st-2nd February 2009, the Union of India engaged Additional Solicitor General Gopal Subramaniam, who convinced the court that the ‘intent to commit a terror act’ which was prerequisite for trial under POTA, could not be established. In this case, the government’s Addl SG was arguing for a criminal, along with the criminal’s lawyer, Nitya Ramakrishnan, one of the left-leaning advocates for whom rights of perpetrators are higher than rights of victims or citizens of this country and over and above national interests.
In a unique situation, the Government of Gujarat filed an SLP, No. 1444 of 2009, and the petitioner filed SLP No. 1700 of 2009. I recall these cases because during the course of discussion with Buch, I mentioned to him that an SLP between the State and the Centre is not good, the Special Leave Petition is basically a citizen’s prerogative. For resolutions of differences between State and Centre, should we not take recourse to Article 130 of the Constitution?
The 17.7.2009 CMs’ Conference
I had been more involved with the 17.7.2009 CMs’ conference. Two new institutions were being carved out in the form of NATGRID and NCTC. It was basically about the Home Minister lecturing to the States about the new initiatives taken by the Ministry of Home Affairs and requesting the States to get involved and reap their benefits.
In addition, we had to take follow up action on the 26.11.2008 case, what with sharing of evidence with Pakistan. We also had to deal with institutional matters relating to the setting up of the NIA. Moreover, the MAC strengthening also required some rigorous work, requiring envisioning of structures, establishing them and locating funding for them.
The Ishrat Jahan case
At the time of writing, the Ishrat Jahan case was an ongoing criminal case in Gujarat, in which the relatives of the dead initially accused officers of the Ahmedabad Police Crime Branch and members of the Subsidiary Intelligence Bureau (SIB) of Ahmedabad of jointly having carried out a staged ‘encounter killing’ by shooting dead four people on 15 June 2004. Those killed in the incident were Ishrat Jahan Raza, a 19-year-old woman from Mumbra, Maharashtra, and three men – Javed Ghulam Sheikh (born Pranesh Pillai), Amjad Ali Rana and Zeeshan Johar.
Several officials associated with the case, including those from Home Ministry and Intelligence Bureau, later accused the then UPA government of changing a counter-affidavit (which I had filed) for political gains. The policemen accused of fake encounter have all denied the charges and appealed to higher courts for discharge. The Supreme Court has decided to hear the plea for quashing action against the Gujarat police.
In July 2009, we received a notice from the Gujarat High Court requiring MHA to file the ‘factual position’ in the case filed by Shamima Kauser, Ishrat Jahan’s mother seeking compensation for custodial death of her daughter. She had, at the outset, called for investigation into the circumstances of her death alleging that it was a custodial death.
A similar notice was also received in respect of another case filed by Gopinathan Pillai, the father of Javed Mohammad Ghulam Shiekh alias Pranesh Kumar Pillai. This plea had been moved in the Supreme Court seeking compensation for the alleged custodial death of the son, which was remitted to the Gujarat High Court.
After perusing the notices, I had a meticulous junior locate the case papers quickly, we perused the inputs then available of this file and after obtaining further inputs from our agencies, I ventured to draft an affidavit (a counter-affidavit) in the case, making clear before the courts the Central government’s (read the MHA’s) position.
It then came to my notice that there had been an Affidavit ( a counter) in the Ishrat Jahan case drafted and sent to the Assistant Solicitor General, Harin Raval at Ahmedabad in 2005. But it was never filed. Mine would be the second such MHA response. The ‘2005 couter-affidavit draft’ is now reported to be missing from official records of the ASG’s office.
After the second preliminary draft was made out, I sent the file to my Director (Internal Security) and he in turn sent it to the Joint Secretary (Internal Security), D Diptivilasa. The Joint Secretary directed me to do proper referencing, which we complied with. Thereafter, the file was sent to Home Minister Chidambaram via the Home Secretary.
The Minister approved it. That Chidambaram had appended his signature on it in approval has already been made public by several news channels through RTI in April 2016. Later it was also sent to the Law Secretary.
After the entire process of approval had been gone through, the fair affidavit was made out. I was then asked to file the government affidavit (counter-affidavit 2009) at Ahmedabad.
It was the day of Rakshabandhan which is also celebrated as Shraavan Pournami in my community. The day next to Shraavan Pournami, we propitiated goddess Gayitri in the morning. I distinctly recall having consulted my father, whether I could undertake the trip. He said ‘yes’ while suggesting that the special prayer to the goddess could be done in Ahmedabad early in the morning. He also gave me the sankalpa (resolve) for the occasion. Accordingly, I took an evening flight to Ahmedabad on 5.8.2009.
I generally stayed in a Central Police Force guest house in the outskirts of Ahmedabad with a beautiful campus. The next morning I went to the office of the Assistant Solicitor General. His name was Pankaj S Champaneri. He asked me to wait in his chambers and left. After few rounds of chai and farsan (the Gujarati savouries which are very delicious) offered by his staff, I got restless. Champaneri returned on the stroke of 12. He told me that the affidavit could not be filed that day. Then I went to the High Registry. They told me that such affidavits could be filed up to 4.00 pm.
On my previous visits to the Gujarat High Court I had identified an eatery where the food was really delicious. It is just outside the High Court complex. I had a quick thali lunch there and came back to the office of the Assistant Solicitor General. I told him that I had spoken to the Registry and they had said, such affidavits could be filed up to 4.00 pm. Champaneri told me that he had spoken to the then Home Secretary, G K Pillai, who had instructed that the affidavit need not be filed. I called my Joint Secretary (IS), and Diptivilasa told me there was no such instruction. I went back to Champaneri and told him that I had spoken to JS (IS) and there was no such instruction. Champaneri then said that Additional Solicitor General Harin Raval had spoken to the Home Secretary. I called my office back to corroborate and confirm.
Thereafter, I went back and I confess, I tersely told Champaneri t
hat I was a man from the MHA Secretariat and I took orders only from the Joint Secretary of the Division I was posted in. Hence, any orders had to be conveyed through him. After that there was a mild altercation. I was in discomfort because having been trained as a lawyer, I had many friends in this profession. I must confess that I was not happy about behaving in less than polite manner with this law officer. But this gentleman now started using dilatory tactics. Ultimately
I told him, ‘… mujhe apna order follow karna hai aur order hai ki affidavit file karo’, and started walking towards the Registry. Fortunately, having been to this High Court on previous occasions in different cases, I was conversant with filing procedure as well as location of the places in the premises. Any newcomer would have lost his way around the Gujarat High Court premises trying to find where the Registry is located. It involved a very long walk through the corridors, right to the back of the building.
Even if one had located the Registry, there was a very elaborate procedure involved in filing counter-affidavits. There was a notice requirement to the concerned litigants which somehow got complied with through dasti (summons) to the respective lawyers whose munshis were fortunately present in the Registry premises. At that time, sensing the seriousness of the matter, the Assistant Solicitor General came running to the Registry, gasping for breath, accompanied by his munshi. This munshi, an affable old man known as Khan Sahib, ensured all requirements were fulfilled and got the counter-affidavit filed just before the closure time on 6th of August 2009.
At that time, I did not know that this case would make history or that I will be a part of this history. I also did not know that this case would cause me so much trauma.
The MHA counter-affidavit, as ordered by the Gujarat High Court, had been filed. Hence, from the MHA side, the case had reached a level of finality. I, naturally, thought everything had been put to rest.