BJP on Wednesday alleged that the CBI has underplayed the role of the lashkar-e-Tayyeba in the Ishrat Jahan encounter case. Reacting to the days’ development, BJP spokesperson Nirmala Sitharaman said it’s surprising the CBI has not revealed anything about the background of the people who were killed in the encounter by the police on June 15, 2004.
She also alleged that the Government might be giving regular instructions to the CBI on the case and therefore the agency is confused on which way to go. The BJP leader said as the UPA Government was at the Centre at the time of the incident, it would have had information about the encounter as the Intelligence Bureau (IB) would have informed it. IB officer Rajinder Kumar was heading State Investigation Bureau during the period when the encounter was carried out.
Expressing surprise over CBI’s theory, the party said that the CBI charge sheet has no mention about whether Ishrat and others were terrorists or not. “The CBI is silent after a protracted investigation in the matter on the background and activities in which these people were involved. After this investigation if CBI can’t describe who these people are, it clearly gives the picture that the CBI charge sheet underplays the role of the leT (lashkar-e-Tayyeba) and indicts the Indian security establishment, demoralising them in the process,” Sitharaman said.
“This encounter happened in 2004 by which time the Union Government was under the Congress-led UPA. And therefore, the IB was reporting to them. Such is the nature of functioning of IB that at least once a week the inputs shared with States are shared with the PM himself,” she said, adding that the official inputs from the IB would have been shared with the Prime Minister as well.