'Pillai knew of Ishrat affidavit changes'

New Delhi: The one-man enquiry committee which probed the missing papers in file relating to the Ishrat Jahan case affidavits has claimed former home secretary G K Pillai was in know of the changes made in the second affidavit to be filed before the Gujarat high court.
The panel noted that a draft copy of a letter addressed to then attorney general late Goolam E Vahanvati by Pillai on September 18, 2009 was recovered by it from the computer of the office of the home secretary, which referred to some discussions in the chamber of then law minister Veerappa Moily as regards the supplementary affidavit.
The panel's claim runs contrary to Pillai's earlier statement to TOI, stating that home minister P Chidambaram had dictated the second affidavit, which dropped references to Ishrat's LeT links and favoured a CBI inquiry into the encounter, in his chamber and only then was the file put up to him.
"...the fact that there was some discussion in the chamber of hon'ble law minister regarding filing of supplementary affidavit has not been recorded anywhere on the file either by the joint secretary or by the then home secretary," said the panel, which has refrained from fixing responsibility for the missing papers, only concluding that they may have been "knowingly" removed or "unintentionally" misplaced".
In his report, Prasad said Diptivilas has also stated that the draft affidavit which was put up along with the draft letter to the law secretary was not in the file when it was returned to him.
"... If the statement of the joint secretary (Diptivilas) is to be believed to be true, then the only possibility that remains is that these documents were delinked/ retained during the movement of file between the then home secretary and the then home ministry," the panel said.