In a revelation that has the potential to spark a fresh political row and disrupt the Parliament functioning, former under secretary for internal security at the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) R.V.S. Mani claimed that he did not draft the second affidavit and had been ordered to sign the file in the Ishrat Jahan case.
According to Times Now reports, Former Under Secretary (Internal security) of Union Home Ministry RVS Mani, who signed both the affidavits in the Ishrat Jahan case alleged that he was tortured by SIT Chief Satish Verma.
RVS Mani revealed that Chidambaram forced him to file the second affidavit in the Ishrat Jahan case which did not name her as a terrorist. The former bureaucrat alleged that he was tortured by then IPS officer Satish Verma by to file the amended affidavit since he was reluctant to do so. “I was burnt with cigarettes. The SIT formed by Government also thrashed another person in front of me in order to break me down psychologically,” Mani said.
“I did not draft the second affidavit, I was ordered to sign file, so I did it. If I am ordered to do something, I have to go and do it. I cannot refuse. I cannot say what the need for the affidavit was? You will have to ask people who ordered it,” Mani told Times Now.
His claims came days after former home secretary G.K. Pillai alleged that former home minister P. Chidambaram “bypassed him” and “rewrote” the second affidavit submitted to a court in this connection.
“I believe in Intelligence Bureau’s (IB) inputs, and there is no reason for not believing in IB inputs. The CBI, however, said IB input is not believable. I refused to back what the CBI said,” he said.
Last week, Pillai had said the Ishrat affidavit was “changed at the political level”.
Chidambaram on Monday said the revised affidavit was “absolutely correct” and “as a minister he accepts full responsibility for the affidavit”.
Hitting back at Pillai, Chidambaram it was disappointing that the former home secretary who was equally responsible wanted to distance himself from that.
Citing intelligence reports, Chidambaram as home minister had submitted an affidavit in the Gujarat High Court in August 2009, which referred to Ishrat’s alleged links with Lashkar-e-Taiba.
However, a revised affidavit was filed within a month, in which all references to Ishrat’s alleged terror links were missing.
Early on the morning of 15 June 2004, Ishrat Jahan (19), Javed Sheikh, Zeeshan Johar and Amjad Ali Rana were shot dead on the road leading to the Kotarpur waterworks on the outskirts of Ahmedabad.
Police claimed that she was part of a plot to assassinate the then chief minister Narendra Modi.
