Gujarat 'encounters' may be linked, suspects CBI

Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) sleuths probing the motive behind the June 2004 fake encounter in Ahmedabad are verifying if it had any alleged links with the January 2003 Sadiq Jamal Mehtar fake encounter that occurred in the same city. Abhishek Sharan reports.

Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) sleuths probing the motive behind the June 2004 fake encounter in Ahmedabad are verifying if it had any alleged links with the January 2003 Sadiq Jamal Mehtar fake encounter that occurred in the same city.

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The CBI suspects one of the four deceased in the June 2004 fake encounter, Javed Shaikh alias Pranesh Pillai, may have allegedly been an Intelligence Bureau (IB) informer who was in touch with a few state Subsidiary Intelligence Bureau (SIB) officials, according to a CBI source.

"We suspect Javed may have been involved in some way in the conspiracy behind the Sadiq Jamal fake encounter, as he was an informer of an IB officer. We are verifying our suspicion; the probe is at a crucial stage," said the source.

A home ministry source, however, rejected the CBI's suspicions saying, "Javed Shaikh was not an IB informer."

The CBI is probing two possible motives behind the killing of the four. Either the deceased may have witnessed a crime and were thus potential threats or the accused police officers may have craved for career-related benefits, according to the source.

Last December, the CBI had filed its charge sheet in the Mehtar encounter case against eight Gujarat policemen invoking charges of criminal conspiracy and murder.

According to the probe findings, a retired assistant director of the IB had allegedly generated a fake source report on Mehtar. He was later allegedly bumped off in a fake encounter on January 13, 2003, in Ahmedabad.