The Supreme Court on Friday referred to a Bench led by Justice Arun Mishra a petition seeking a court-monitored probe into the murder of former Gujarat Home Minister Haren Pandya in 2003.
A Bench led by Justice A.K. Sikri, before which the petition filed by the NGO Centre for Public Interest Litigation (CPIL), came up on Friday, listed the case, in turn, before Justice Mishra’s Bench as the latter had already heard an appeal in the same Pandya death case.
Though Solicitor General Tushar Mehta questioned the role of an NGO in a murder case, advocate Prashant Bhushan for CPIL began by submitting that the petition was filed to draw the court’s attention to fresh evidence which has come to light.
However, Justice Sikri addressed the lawyers, saying the same Bench that heard the appeal should examine this petition.
The court then referred the petition to a Bench of Justices Mishra and Vineet Saran.
Pandya, a former Minister of State for Home in the then Narendra Modi government in Gujarat, was shot dead on March 26, 2003, in Ahmedabad, during his morning walk.
The petition said the fresh information it had on the case was “startling.”
“New pieces of information that have come to light regarding the possibility of IPS officers, including D. G. Vanzara being involved in the conspiracy to kill Pandya, clearly show that the involvement of the senior functionaries of the police as well as possible complicity of political figures. The investigation has clearly been ‘botched’ to benefit powerful figures in the administration,” the petition claimed.
It alleges that Pandya was killed by henchmen who were acting on the basis of a contract put out by D.G. Vanzara. The allegation, the petition said, is based on a recent witness testimony in the Sohrabuddin Sheikh fake encounter case.