Additional Secretary from the Home Ministry, BK Prasad, submitted his inquiry report on the missing files on Wednesday.
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Question by AS (F) & Enquiry officer: “Can you please tell me in whose custody the above missing papers could be now?”
After a controversy broke out over purported “tutoring” of witnesses in Ishrat Jahan case, senior Home Ministry official B K Prasad on Thursday rejected the allegation and claimed to have conducted a “free and fair” enquiry.
The first affidavit was filed on the basis of inputs from Maharashtra and Gujarat Police besides the Intelligence Bureau where it was said the 19-year-old girl from Mumbai outskirts was a Lashkar-e-Toiba activist but it was ignored in the second affidavit, Home Ministry officials said, as per PTI.
Talking to reporters here, AICC spokesperson Anand Sharma alleged that the National Democratic Alliance government was trying to derail the trial in the Ishrat Jahan encounter case.
In a statement after a report suggested that the panel probing to find the missing files related to Ishrat Jahan case “tutored” a witness, Chidambaram said the news report “comprehensively exposed the fake controversy” created by the NDA government on the two affidavits filed by the central government in the case.
Reacting sharply to a news report published by The Indian Express, Prasad said, “First of all, it is unethical to record my conversation that also with another officer without my permission and knowledge”.
The report also mentions that the fact that the documents were missing was not flagged in September 2009 by the then joint secretary (internal security), D. Diptivilasa, and that the matter came to light only in 2013 when his successor, Rakesh Singh, raised the issue, but apparently no follow-up action was initiated. The file passed through the hands of the Home Secretary at least three or four times.
“The report caused an uproar in Gujarat and elsewhere.The first affidavit was misinterpreted and misused to defend the encounter”. They might get misplaced.
The one-member panel was constituted after Home Minister Rajnath Singh disclosed in Parliament on March 10 that the files were missing.
“The five “missing” documents completely vindicate the position I had taken. The nation has to realise now we have a dirty tricks department coordinated by PMO”, he said claiming that the whole attempt is to “deflect and divert” attention from issues before the Gujarat High Court in the case.
However, if you think about it, the penny finally drops when you realise that the journalist who recorded the other conversation was just lucky enough to have eavesdropped on it.
The former Home Minister said the draft of the “further affidavit” was vetted by the Attorney General, the highest law officer of the country, before it was filed.
The Congress however, dismissed the inquiry panel’s finding that the files went missing in September 2009, when party leader P. Chidambaram was home minister.
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The BJP-led government accuses the previous Congress regime of exonerating Ishrat of terror charges to suit its political agenda of targeting Narendra Modi, who was the Gujarat CM when the encounter took place in Ahmedabad.
