Sohrabuddin case: Brother seeks narco test on Shah, others

Mumbai, Aug 1: Slain gangster Sohrabuddin Sheikh's brother on Friday moved the special CBI court seeking directions to conduct narco-analysis test on BJP President Amit Shah and 37 others accused in the Sohrabuddin Sheikh and Tulsiram Prajapati encounter cases.

The court is likely to hear the application on August 14. In the application moved before special CBI judge B H Loya, Sheikh's brother Rubabuddin said that the CBI has not decided who was the mastermind behind his brother's killing.

"CBI has not decided on the mastermind and the role of each accused", said Rubabuddin through his lawyer Feroz Khan Phatan. Meanwhile Shah did not appear in the court and moved an exemption application which was opposed by CBI.

However the court allowed the exemption application. Shah in his exemption application said that he was president of a National Party and he was busy in meeting various leaders from different states as assembly elections are scheduled later in the year.

Phatan also sought some more time to challenge the transfer order of the Judge Loya's predecessor saying that the apex court, while transferring the case from Gujarat to Mumbai, had said that a single judge will conduct the entire trial. Loya's predecessor Judge JT Utpat was transferred to Pune on June 25.

The CBI has charge-sheeted Shah, a former Minister of State for Home of Gujarat, and 37 others, including several police officers, in the two cases of alleged fake encounters.

According to CBI, gangster Sohrabuddin, who was claimed to have links to Pakistan-based terror group Lashkar-e-Taiba, and his wife Kauser Bi were abducted by Gujarat's Anti-Terrorism Squad when they were on way from Hyderabad to Sangli in Maharashtra and killed in an alleged staged encounter near Gandhinagar in November 2005.

Prajapati, an eyewitness to the encounter, was killed by police at Chapri village in Banaskantha district of Gujarat in December 2006. According to the CBI, Shah was allegedly involved in the conspiracy behind both the incidents.

PTI