Modi wanted Muslims to be taught a lesson: Gujarat cop

AHMEDABAD: The Supreme Court might finally have got its first piece of direct evidence against Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi and his role in the 2002 riots.

An IPS officer from Gujarat, Sanjiv Bhatt, who claimed to have attended Modi's meeting on the evening of February 27, 2002, after the Godhra carnage, has filed an affidavit before the apex court alleging that Modi told government officials that it was time to let Hindus vent their anger.
Fifty-nine passengers, mostly kar sevaks, were killed on the S-6 coach of Sabarmati Express that day, sparking riots throughout the state.
Bhatt, who was superintendent of police (intelligence) then, says in his affidavit that Modi insisted that the bodies of those killed on the Sabarmati Express be brought to Ahmedabad, against the advice of government officials. He says Modi's instructions reflected in the half-hearted approach of the police to the violence that followed February 28, 2002, onwards throughout the state.
Bhatt also alleges that the SC-appointed special investigation team (SIT) was reluctant to record all this evidence and tried telling him to limit his testimony to the Meghaninagar case which was about the killings at Gulbarg society. According to the officer, the SIT recorded this evidence only after he insisted that this procedural constraint would defeat the purpose of probing the larger conspiracy.
Bhatt says that he filed the affidavit because he found the SIT leaking all the information he gave in confidence to the state government. He adds that he wrote to SIT chairman R K Raghavan about this.
The affidavit says that at the end of the meeting on February 27, 2002, officers tried to tell Modi that the decision to bring the bodies to Ahmedabad, and BJP's supporting VHP's bandh call, would definitely lead to an outbreak of communal violence in Ahmedabad and across the state.
However, the affidavit citing Bhatt's testimony before SIT says Modi told the gathering, "...that for too long the Gujarat police had been following the principle of balancing the actions against the Hindus and Muslims while dealing with the communal riots in Gujarat. This time the situation warranted that the Muslims be taught a lesson to ensure that such incidents do not recur ever again".
Bhatt says, "Chief minister Shri Narendra Modi expressed the view that the emotions were running very high amongst the Hindus and it was imperative that they be allowed to vent out their anger."
Bhatt recorded this evidence before SIT's DIG A K Malhotra over four days beginning March 21.

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