By IANS,
New Delhi: The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Wednesday alleged the union home ministry was intending to revise its affidavit before the Gujarat High Court that says college student Ishrat Jahan and her three friends killed in a firefight with police had terrorist links.
“In the Ishrat Jahan case, the home ministry has an intention to revise the affidavit it had submitted earlier. In its earlier affidavit to the Gujarat High Court, the ministry had said the centre had information that LeT (Lashkar-e-Taiba) is planning to assassinate top leaders of Gujarat,” BJP spokesperson Rajiv Pratap Rudy told reporters here.
“The home ministry is ready to falsify itself for political gains,” Rudy alleged.
The four were killed on the outskirts of Ahmedabad in June 2004 by the Gujarat police, which claimed they were LeT operatives on a mission to kill Chief Minister Narendra Modi.
A recent report of an Ahmedabad metropolitan magistrate, who made the investigations, said the police had faked the shootout and that the four were killed in cold blood.
Questioning the report, the BJP noted that the Congress-led central government’s own affidavit before the high court had stated that Ishrat Jahan and others had LeT links.
“On the basis of this affidavit, the Gujarat High Court has (now) stayed the magisterial report of Mr. (M.P.) Tamang. Even Home Secretary (G.K.) Pillai had said the affidavit was based on intelligence reports,” Rudy said.
“Affidavits are sworn statements. Are we made to understand that the government had filed a false affidavit earlier?”
He said the attempts to alter the affidavit hinged on “anti-Modi feelings”.
“The grouse of defeat in Gujarat is being retaliated by appeasement (of Muslims). The LeT’s official website has claimed that all four were their agents, then why the government of India is trying to prove the contrary?”
The BJP spokesperson also said the home ministry was diluting the institution of Intelligence Bureau (IB). “We have seen the result of (the) states ignoring intelligence inputs of the central government during 26/11 (Mumbai terrorist attacks).”
“Now, the home ministry is suggesting to trash all reports of the IB. It seems (the) institution of IB is under threat. This dilution demands an answer,” Rudy added.