No need for CBI in Una: Government tells Ahmedabad High Court

AHMEDABAD: The Gujarat government on Wednesday told the high court that the probe in the Una dalit flogging case had been conducted fairly by CID (crime) and there was no need for CBI to probe the case.
The state government's reply came in response to a public interest litigation (PIL) filed by a city-based activist Kanti Chavda through advocate Ratna Vora. The PIL sought a CBI probe in the Una atrocity case.
The Una flogging case had sparked national outrage after four dalit youths, Ramesh, Ashok, Vashram and Bechar Sarvaiya, were flogged in public by gau rakshaks for skinning a dead cow. Government pleader, Manisha Luvkumar, submitted that there was no lacunae in the probe conducted by the team of three officials, IGP Shashikant Trivedi, SP Sujata Majmudar and DSP K G Sarvada. They had conducted thorough investigation and filed chargesheet in the case. As many as 18 pages of the chargesheet were put before the high court on Wednesday.
Until now, 43 accused have been arrested in the case, including four police officials. Identification test of 33 persons was also conducted, Luvkumar said before a division bench of HC Chief Justice R S Reddy and Justice V M Pancholi.
Luvkumar stated that the investigation agency also sent some articles used in the offence for FSL report. The state agency found that no cow had been slaughtered by the dalits, and that fact has been submitted in the chargesheet, she said. The advocate for the petitioner objected to the state government's submission and stated that they have produced only the last few pages of the chargesheet before the court. Vora said the petitioner has no faith in the CID (crime) probe, as it was the same agency which had unfairly investigated the 2012 Thangadh firing case, where three youths of the dalit community had been gunned down by police.