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Ishrat case: ‘Greedy CBI officials’ framed me, says former IB director
Rajinder Kumar was one of the four IB officials chargesheeted by the CBI, along with many others from Gujarat Police in the Ishrat Jahan encounter case.
Former Intelligence Bureau (IB) special director Rajinder Kumar on Thursday said a conspiracy was hatched by greedy officials in the CBI as well as others to frame him for the murders of Ishrat Jahan and three others. The officials were looking for post-retirement benefits, he alleged.
Kumar was one of the four IB officials chargesheeted by the CBI, along with many others from Gujarat Police. “My anger is not against the CBI as an institution, but against certain officers who framed me. Where is evidence in the chargesheet that four killed were not terrorists? Stories were planted against me in media that I created fake intelligence inputs but my officers were tortured to frame me and the media published them,” said Kumar, who was ultimately not tried as the home ministry refused sanction to prosecute him.
Kumar revealed that a senior CBI officer wrote in the file that there was no case against him but was overruled by seniors.
Kumar has filed an RTI application with the ministry of personnel, the administrative ministry of the CBI, seeking disclosure of correspondence between the CBI and law ministry and the attorney general’s opinion in the case.
Meanwhile, DIG DG Vanzara, who headed the encounter, asserted that David Coleman Headley’s deposition was something the Gujarat police had stated since the encounter. “Since 2004, we have said they were terrorists. There were intelligence inputs for us to act on. Even the mouthpiece of LeT, issued from Lahore, had mentioned that Jahan was their operative. But the matter was politicised and projected as a fake encounter,” said Vanzara.
