Chandigarh: Former Gujarat police officers DG Vanzara and NK Amin will no longer be accused in the 2004 Ishrat Jehan fake encounter killing as an Indian court today approved their request for discharge after Gujarat Government refused to grant sanction for their prosecution.
The former police officers had been charged with conspiracy, illegal confinement and murder in the Ishrat Jehan case by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI).
DG Vanzara and NK Amin had filed discharge requests in the Special CBI court after the Gujarat government refused to grant sanctions to the CBI to prosecute them.
Special CBI court judge J K Pandya said since the government had not sanctioned their prosecution, their discharge pleas would be allowed and the case against them would be dropped.
Former Gujarat police chief PP Pandey had been discharged in the case last year.
19-year-old Ishrat Jehan and three others were killed in June 2004 near Ahmedabad by Gujarat police officers who claimed that they were planning to assassinate Narendra Modi, who was then Chief Minister.
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The CBI’s first charge-sheet in 2013 named seven Gujarat police officers including Mr Pandey, DG Vanzara and GL Singhal.
Present BJP president and the then Gujarat Home Minister Amit Shah was also a suspect in this case but he was given clean chit by CBI in May 2014, soon after the present BJP government had resumed power in the Centre.