The Special Investigation Team (SIT), probing the alleged fabrication of evidence and tutoring witnesses in the 2002 post-Godhra riots case against activist Teesta Setalvad, ex DGP R B Sreekumar, and ex DIG Sanjiv Bhatt, has summoned former IPS officer Rahul Sharma for questioning.
"We have issued him a summons to record his statement with regard to the ongoing investigation," a senior officer, who is part of the SIT, told DH while confirming the development. Sharma was not available for comments.
The 1992-batch IPS officer Sharma, who is a practicing lawyer at Gujarat high court, was known for providing Call Detail Records (CDR) of then-ministers and other VVIPs during the riots. Zakia Jafri, the widow of ex-Congress MP Ahsan Jafri, had cited him as one of the key witnesses in her complaint against then chief minister Narendra Modi and others for their alleged roles in the communal riots.
On June 25, a day after the Supreme court passed a judgement dismissing Zakia Jafri's petition for an investigation into a larger conspiracy behind the 2002 riots, DCB filed an FIR against Setalvad, Bhatt and Sreekumar. The apex court made adverse remarks against Setalvad, and others while stating, "those who had kept the pot boiling" with an "ulterior motive" for the past 16 years should be in the dock and be "proceeded with in accordance with the law". A day later, an FIR was registered against Setalvad, Sreekumar and Bhatt. All of them are behind bars.
When asked if Sharma is being made an accused along with Setalvad and others, SIT officials maintained that "he is being called to record a statement as part of the investigation."
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Sharma, who took voluntary retirement after numerous run-ins with the state government in 2015, had obtained CDR from two mobile phone service providers which contained call records between February 25 and March 4, 2002. Sharma procured this while briefly assisting the Ahmedabad Detection of Crime Branch (DCB) in investigating rioting-related cases. Sharma started facing a series of departmental proceedings after he made the details public.
So far, the SIT has alleged that Setalvad and others colluded with politicians, including senior Congress leader late Ahmed Patel to "destabilize" the then Gujarat government led by Narendra Modi. The SIT has alleged that Setalvad took Rs30 lakh in cash at different times from Patel.