Ishrat Jahan case: Panel to examine Pillai, others

The Ishrat panel, set up by the Union home ministry to probe the missing files in the case of alleged fake encounter of Ishrat Jahan in Gujarat, will examine officers who handled the files at the time they went missing. Once the panel determines the “exact period” of the documents that have gone missing, it can call officials, both serving and retired to probe the case. In this regard, former Union home secretary G.K. Pillai may be examined by the one-man inquiry panel if it is required, sources said adding that it will surely take sometime before the panel decides to call top officials to gather evidence.

The panel does not have powers to summon but it can request the serving and retired officials who handled the files to share information with it.

Mr Pillai was the Union home secretary when the home ministry had filed two contradictory affidavits in the Gujarat high court in 2009 on the Ishrat Jahan case.

The inquiry, by additional secretary in the home ministry B.K. Prasad, was ordered by the home ministry after it was found that some papers related to the Ishrat Jahan case went missing.

The probe panel has been mandated to inquire into the circumstances in which the files related to the case of Ishrat Jahan, the 19-year-old Mumbra college student, went missing. For now, the panel is gathering evidence to find out the persons responsible for keeping the files and relevant issues. The papers, which went missing from the home ministry include the copy of an affidavit vetted by the Attorney-General and submitted in the Gujarat high court in 2009 and the draft of the second affidavit vetted by the A-G on which changes were made.

Two letters written by Mr Pillai to the then A-G, late G.E. Vahanvati, and the copy of the draft affidavit have so far been untraceable. Home minister Rajnath Singh had disclosed in Parliament on March 10 that the files were missing.

The first affidavit was filed on the basis of inputs from the Maharashtra and Gujarat police besides the Intelligence Bureau where it was said that the 19-year-old girl from Mumbai outskirts was a Lashkar-e-Tayyaba activist but it was ignored in the second affidavit, the home ministry officials said.