New Delhi, July 11
The Supreme Court today ordered scrutiny of voluminous records of 13 major Gujarat riot cases by a senior Delhi Sessions Court Judge to determine whether re-investigation by the CBI in those cases is needed and consequently the trial is to be held outside the state.
A Bench of Mr Justice K G Balakrishnan, Mr Justice Tarun Chatterjee and Mr
Justice D K Jain asked the Delhi High Court acting Chief Justice to spare the services of a senior Additional Sessions Judge (ASJ) of Delhi subordinate judiciary to assist the Supreme Court Registry to examine the documents forwarded to it by the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) in 10 major cases and some other petitioners.
The apex court had stayed trial in 10 cases mentioned by the NHRC for CBI probe and transfer outside Gujarat on November 21, 2003. In a subsequent development, only the Best Bakery case was transferred to Mumbai in which 14 of the 21 accused who were acquitted by a Vadodra court were found guilty of mass killings.
The Bench said the Sessions Judge to be appointed would sit in the apex court itself and complete the exercise within four weeks and submit a report whether there was need for probe by the CBI.
The cases sought to be re-investigated by the NHRC and other petitioners include Godhra train carnage,
Naroda Patia massacre, Gulberga Society mass killings where a Congress MP was among the victims, Sardarpur riots, Ode killings and some other mass murders. Meanwhile, Solicitor-General G E Vahanvati on instructions from the Union Government amidst over two-hour long proceedings submitted that the Centre would like to assist the Court in finding out the truth and the CBI was ready to take up the responsibility if asked to probe the cases.
Gujarat Government counsel Mukul Rohtagi strongly objected to the procedure being followed by the apex court in these cases to order re-investigation on public interest petitions and “giving a go-by to the set procedure laid down in the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC) to deal with criminal cases.”
He said under the CrPC provisions, if at all re-investigation was required then the petitioners would have to move the Gujarat High Court. “This will cast doubts on the functioning of the entire judicial system in Gujarat,” he argued.
But the Bench pointed out that allegations arising out of the NHRC petition were of very serious nature and needed to be handled differently. “Should we ignore the material that has come before the Court or any situation where the system has collapsed,” it asked.
The Court said when it had earlier ordered fresh examination of 2008 cases by a high powered committee after those were closed by the police on summary investigation, it was found that 1950 of them were wrongly closed and the magistrates had accepted the police closure reports.
While fixing further hearing for August 29, the Court pointed out that the material suggested serious lapses on the part of the police in recording of the statements of victims and witnesses, not registering the FIRs according to their statements and shoddy investigation.
