Gujarat HC terms Banerjee Committee as illegal

Ahmedabad, Oct 13 (UNI) The Gujarat High Court today termed the setting up of the U C Banerjee Committee by the Railway Ministry as ''unconstitutional, illegal and void'' and said its report should not be tabled in Parliament.

Coming down heavily on the Railway Ministry for appointing the Committee to probe certain aspects of the Godhra train carnage, Justice D M Patel said the Indian Railways had no authority to appoint such a Committee. It has been done in gross violation of the provisions contained in Sections 113, 114, 115, 116 and 119 of the Indian Railway Act.

The court said even under Railway Accident rules, if there is any inquiry, then the report should be strictly kept confidential.

But in this case this was not observed as the interim report was given wide publicity, just two days before the Assembly elections in Bihar in January 2005.

The Committee, headed by the former Supreme Court judge, was set up to probe the incident in which 58 'kar sevaks' perished in a fire in S-6 coach of Sabarmati Express in February 2002.

Justice Patel passed the order on a petition filed by a carnage survivor, Neelkanth Bhatia, who had challenged the setting up of the Banerjee Committee at a time when Justice Nanavati-Shah Commission was already probing the matter.

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