Centre armtwisting CBI in Ishrat case for political gains, claims BJP

The BJP accused the Centre of trying to pressurise the Intelligence Bureau for political purposes following the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI)’s move to question some Intelligence Bureau (IB) officials to find out the “truth” about the inputs that led to the Ishrat Jahan encounter in 2004.

The BJP accused the Centre of trying to pressurise the Intelligence Bureau for political purposes following the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI)’s move to question some Intelligence Bureau (IB) officials to find out the “truth” about the inputs that led to the Ishrat Jahan encounter in 2004.

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According to the CBI, an IB officer sent a “false input” of threat to Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi that was passed on to the Gujarat police. Based on the inputs that some suspected Pakistani terrorists belonging to Lashkar-e-Toiba were in Gujarat to kill Modi, the state police killed four people during an encounter on the outskirts of Ahmedabad.

The top IB officer, who passed on the inputs, was posted in Gujarat in 2004. According to an agency source, it has recorded the statement of “a senior IB official.” “The BJP has cautioned repeatedly that under the Congress-led UPA, the misuse of the Central Bureau of Investigation is rampant. We fear the IB too is being misused by the UPA,” party spokesperson Nirmala Sitharaman said.

She said IB shares critical intelligence with the states and an outcome of such a work arrangement was seen on 15 June 2004, when 4 terrorists including Isharat Jahan and Pranesh Pillai alias Javed Sheikh were killed. Gujarat police acted on IB information about their movements.

“...in 2010, media reported that David Headley, the brain behind the Mumbai attack implicated Ishrat as a fideyeen of the LeT. Strangely, the National Investigation Agency (NIA) under the UPA government denied these media reports,” she said.

Sitharaman said a CBI inspector will now go into all the factors leading to IB’s sharing of information. “There is now an environment of trust deficit among the intelligence and security agencies of the country...for serving short term political agenda, issues of national security are being exposed.

Fearing arrest, Guj top cop moves SC
new Delhi: Fearing arrest in the Ishrat case, one of the top Gujarat police officials on Friday approached the Supreme Court with a plea to quash the proceedings against him in the case.

Acting on the petition of additional DGP PP Pandey Justices Gyan Sudha Misra and Madan B Lokur issued notice to the CBI. He is facing a special CBI court arrest warrant that was issued on May 2 after he failed to respond to the CBI summons. HTC