By TwoCircles.net investigative team,
New Delhi: Post-mortem report acquired through an RTI application reveals that Sohrabuddin Shaikh was shot five-times fired from a close range- one to his brain. He was shot three times on his leg and once on his upper body but probably the fatal blow was a shot to his brain that left an exit wound 1.2 cm big in the back of his head.
Post-mortem report was released after an RTI application was filed by Afroz Alam Sahil, an RTI activist. Though many arrests have been made related to Sohrabuddin and his wife Kausar Bi’s killings but it is the first time that post-mortem has been made public which is an important document for Sohrabuddin encounter case.
The post-mortem was done by a team of five doctors of Department of Forensic Medicine of BJ Medical College & Civil Hospital of Ahmedabad. The post-mortem that started at 4pm on November 26th said that at the time of examination they found that “rigor mortis is present all over the body.” Rigor mortis is the stiffness of body due to death suggesting that Sohrabuddin was killed at least 12 hours before the time his body was examined.
Post-mortem report also highlight the fact that shots fired at his body were downwards in angle suggesting that the victim was either lying or kneeling down when he was shot at, discounting police theory that he was trying to escape.
A page from the post-mortem report showing entry and exit wounds of shots fired at Sohrabuddin’s upper-body.
Shubhradeep Chakravorty who has made documentary “Encountered on Saffron Agenda” investigated several cases of encounters in Gujarat including Sohrabuddin Shaikh told TwoCircles.net that this post-mortem report backs-up his own investigation into this case which clearly showed that Sohrabuddin’s killing was a case of fake encounter.
“If this post-mortem report was made public earlier, it could have easily proved that police stories about this killing were false.” Chakrovorty added, “one need to look at this report and can also check the old Police claim that how he was killed, by doing this one can learn how lies were manufactured in this case and elsewhere.”
Chakravorty also said what lawyer Huzefa Ahmadi said in the documentary was relevant today. He had said that because after many months it is proved that encounter was fake we cannot get direct evidences and have to rely on the circumstantial evidences.
Sohrabuddin was killed in Ahmadabad on November 26, 2005 in a joint Gujarat- Rajasthan police operation. Police at that time claimed that Sohrabuddin was a Lashkar-e-Toiba operative and killed while trying to escape.
Sohrabuddin Shaikh along with his wife Kausar Bi was kidnapped by the Anti-Terrorist Squad (ATS) of the Gujarat police on November 23, 2005. Shaikh was coming to Gujarat from Hyderabad in a public bus. He was killed early morning on November 26 on a highway in Ahmadabad. In 2007, Gujarat government finally admitted that Kausar Bi was also killed and her body disposed off.
In November 2006, Prashant Dayal, a journalist with Dainik Bhaskar investigated the killing and revealed holes in police version of events. This led to court-appointed investigations and arrests of Deputy Commission of Police DG Vanzara, IPS officer Abhay Chudasama, and state Home Minister Amit Shah.