Sohrabuddin Shaikh encounter case: HC upholds acquittal of 22 accused

The court dismissed the appeals filed by the slain gangster’s brothers, Rubabuddin and Nayabuddin Shaikh, against the December 2018 verdict of a special CBI court

MUMBAI: The Bombay High Court on Thursday upheld the acquittal of the 22 accused, including 21 police officers, in the alleged fake encounter killings and murder of gangster Sohrabuddin Shaikh, his wife Kausar Bi, and associate Tulsiram Prajapati between November 2005 and December 2006.

Fake Encounter - Sohrabuddin Sheikh Murder Case - The encounter scene in Gandhinagar where Sohrabuddin was shot two years back on November 26, 2005 - HT Photo

A division bench of chief justice Shree Chandrashekhar and justice Gautam Ankhad dismissed the appeals filed by the slain gangster’s brothers, Rubabuddin and Nayabuddin Shaikh, against the December 2018 verdict of a special CBI court, which acquitted the 22 accused due to lack of evidence and witnesses turning hostile.

The 22 acquitted accused include 21 junior-level officers from the Gujarat and Rajasthan police and the owner of a farmhouse in Gujarat where Shaikh and his wife were allegedly detained before they were killed. The detailed judgement of the high court is not yet available.

The special CBI court, while acquitting the accused, had observed that the prosecution failed to establish a cogent case to suggest there had been any conspiracy to kill Shaikh and the others, and that the accused persons had any role in it.

The case dates back to November 23, 2005, when Sohrabuddin, Kausar Bi and Prajapati were travelling by bus from Hyderabad to Sangli. A joint team of the Gujarat and Rajasthan police intercepted the bus at Zahirabad in Telangana and took the trio into custody.

Sohrabuddin and Kausar Bi were allegedly taken to a farmhouse in Valsad and later shifted to a guesthouse near Ahmedabad, while Prajapati was taken into custody by the Rajasthan police in connection with a case registered against him in Bhilwara.

According to the CBI, officers from the Gujarat and Rajasthan police killed Sohrabuddin in a fake encounter on a highway in Ahmedabad on November 26, 2005. The police claimed he opened fire on officers, and they killed him in self-defence. Kausar Bi was allegedly killed three days later, and her body was burned.

Sohrabuddin’s brother, Rubabuddin, then wrote to the chief justice of India, seeking an inquiry into the deaths. He claimed that his brother was killed in a fake encounter, and his wife was then murdered to destroy evidence.

Based on the top court’s directions, when a preliminary inquiry was carried out in the case, a Gujarat police officer at the time, VL Solanki, sought to examine Prajapati, claiming that he was a witness to Sohrabuddin and Kausar Bi’s abduction.

Days later, on December 28, 2006, Prajapati was killed in a police encounter. Police claimed he tried to escape while being escorted back to Udaipur jail from a court hearing in Ahmedabad. They claimed he was killed in a subsequent exchange of fire near the Gujarat-Rajasthan border.

On the apex court’s directions, the Gujarat CID investigated the case in 2007 and concluded that the encounters were fake. The CID also ruled that Kausar Bi had been subsequently murdered and her body was disposed of in the Illol village in Gujarat.

Eventually, in 2010, the case was transferred to the CBI, and the trial was shifted to Mumbai on the directions of the apex court. By this time, 38 accused had been booked in the case, including IPS officers and ministers from Gujarat and Rajasthan, including Amit Shah, then the home minister of Gujarat.

Sixteen of the 38 accused, including Shah, were discharged from the case between 2014 and 2017, while the remaining 22 accused faced trial. They were eventually acquitted on December 21, 2018, as 92 of the 210 prosecution witnesses turned hostile. The special CBI court, in its judgment, had cited insufficient evidence and the prosecution’s failure to prove its case beyond a reasonable doubt.

Sohrabuddin’s brothers, in their appeal, claimed that the trial was flawed and cited instances in which witnesses later said their testimonies were not accurately recorded by the trial court. The appeal sought to quash the judgment and to order a retrial in the case.