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Zakia’s lawyer asks why cops were inactive in Gujarat riots

Zakia Jafri, a septuagenarian widow whose politician husband was killed in the 2002 communal riots in Gujarat, has accused the Supreme Court-appointed Special Investigation Team (SIT) of not probing why the police remained inactive during the violent Hindu-Muslim clashes and let the bloodbath spread across the Bharatiya Janata party-ruled state.

Opposing SIT’s clean chit to Chief Minister Narendra Modi and 57 others on charges of hatching a conspiracy behind the riots, her lawyer Mihir Desai told the court hearing her protest petition that SIT had shown complete disregard to probe the reasons for Gujarat police’s inaction against rioters. He said the state police had become paralysed and not made any arrest even though as many as 36 incidents of communal violence occurred on February 27 and 28, 2002 after the Godhra train fire incident.

The senior counsel also submitted that the investigators had not probed if there were instructions from government functionaries to the police to become inactive. “The state government played a suspicious role and its criminal negligence is clearly visible,” he argued.

Desai reiterated the improper use of the army to quell the riots, and also highlighted inaction on part of the government to take action against newspapers for provocative coverage. The next hearing is scheduled for August 27. -mahesh@khaleejtimes.com