[Reader-list] PROBE CHARGES AGAINST TEESTA, COURT TELLS SIT

[Bipin Trivedi]

TIMES NEWS NETWORK 

Ahmedabad: A day after approaching the court hearing the Naroda Gam case,
former aide of Teesta Setalvad of Citizens for Peace and Justice, Rais Khan
expressed his willingness before the court of Gulbarg Society massacre case
to reveal how the social activist allegedly tutored witnesses to launch an
attack against chief minister Narendra Modi. 

Khan filed an application urging the court to make him a witness in the case
so that he could throw light on how Teesta had actually controlled the
witnesses and filed false affidavits in the Supreme Court. 

Acting on his application, special judge BU Joshi directed the Supreme
Court-appointed special investigation team (SIT) to record Khan's statement,
investigate the matter and submit a report in the court by November 18. 

However, the judge did not issue any order on Khan's plea that he be made a
witness under the provision of Section 311 of CrPC. Khan reiterated how the
witnesses were tutored and he himself offered his services in detaining the
witnesses of the Gulbarg Society case in a flat in Shah-e-Alam to avoid any
deposition before the Nanavati-Shah commission, which was probing the 2002
riots case. 

The witnesses in the case have been accusing the judge of being prejudiced
towards witnesses and have sought his transfer from the case. 

Their plea in this regard has been dismissed by the principal sessions judge
and later by Gujarat high court. The issue is pending before the SC as well
as the chief justice of the high court on administrative side. 

'She tried to use Vitthalbhai' 

In his application, Rais Khan claimed that before joining Zakia Jafri in
filing an application against Modi, other politicians and bureaucrats,
Teesta had planned to file a complaint against the state machinery through
Vitthalbhai Pandya, father of former state homer minister Haren Pandya. This
was because Vitthalbhai was charging Modi with Pandya's murder and demanding
a thorough probe into the incident. However, Khan claimed, Vitthalbhai was
not convinced with the list of persons to be held responsible for Pandya's
murder and did not sign the complaint, which was prepared by Teesta and her
lawyer Suhail Tirmizi. By describing this incident, Khan has challenged
Zakia's statement before court last month that she had not taken any help
from Teesta. 

TNN