The Gujarat government on Monday opposed CBI probe into the 2004 encounter of Ishrat Jahan and three others, in the Gujarat High Court.
Advocate General Kamal Trivedi appearing on behalf of the state also contended that magistrate S P Tamang's report which had claimed the encounter was fake, was unwarranted and beyond his jurisdiction.
Trivedi put forth the contentions before the division bench of Justices Jayant Patel and Abhilasha Kumari which was hearing a bunch of petitions demanding CBI probe into the case.
He submitted that there was already a special investigation team (SIT) constituted by the high court to probe the encounter in which Ishrat was gunned down by the Gujarat police along with Javed Ghulam Sheikh alias Pranesh Kumar Pillai, Amjad Ali alias Rajkumar Akbar Ali Rana and Jisan Johar Abdul Gani in Ahmedabad on June 15,2004.
Trivedi said that the encounter followed specific input from the central intelligence stating that the four people were Lashkar-e-Taiba operatives on a mission to kill Chief Minister Narendra Modi and carry out attacks on various parts of India including Gujarat.
It is important what the court thinks about the case irrespective of what the Centre government does which had earlier opposed CBI probe, but now has changed its stance, he submitted.
