INDIA: Fake jail for Gujarat encounter cop

It was Rajkumar Pandian's day out. The suspended IPS officer who has been arrested in two of the most sensitive fake encounters of Gujarat - Sohrabuddin Sheikh and Tulsiram Prajapati - was allowed to go home without any police escorts on Sunday night.

This nocturnal jaunt was caught on camera by a local news TV channel on Sunday. Before going home, he even spent some time at a government guest house in thewalled city and registered himself there.

Pandian was brought to Ahmedabad from Mumbai and was escorted by the Maharashtra police. The cops, arrested in the Sohrabuddin Sheikh case have been shifted to the Taloja jail on the outskirts of Mumbai because the case will now be heard by the CBI court in Mumbai. However, the Tulsiram case is being heard in the CBI court in Ahmedabad for which Pandian and other accused are brought here often.

Ideally, the accused should be brought a day before the hearing and kept in judicial custody at the Sabarmati Central Jail. Before the court hearing, they are taken into custody by police escorts. In the sting operation, the nocturnal activities of Pandian are contrary to the specified norms for undertrial prisoners.

After the sting exposed the comforts accorded to Pandian, a CBI official said, "We have taken up the matter and have written a letter to the news channel. We have sought visuals of the sting operation."

The agency plans to report this matter to the court. The state government, however, seems to have washed its hands off the controversy. Home secretary S K Nanda said, "Gujarat Police has got no role to play in the entire issue. Pandian was brought from Mumbai by a team of the respective police force. They are in custody of Maharashtra jail and now Maharashtra police. The Gujarat police was in no way associated with the operation.He said that usually the police have to send the accused to jail when they bring them for a hearing. If the CBI court asks us whether the Sabarmati Central Jail was informed, we would clarify our stand. It is the responsibility of Mumbai police officialsto send the accused to jail."

The director general of police (DGP), Gujarat Amitabh Pathak has said, "This matter officially does not concern us," he said. "But since the news was being telecast by a news channel, we have taken a note of the matter and I have asked additional DGP (intelligence) Shivanand Jha to conduct and internal verification of the issue."

Source: Times of India (30/04/2013): http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Fake-jail-for-Gujarat-encounter-cop/articleshow/19793810.cms