Teesta seeks quashing of complaint, govt opposess it in High court

Teesta Javed (Setalvad), accused in the 2006 Pandarwada body-exhumation case, has moved the Gujarat High Court seeking quashing of the criminal case against her.

The matter was heard by Justice P P Bhatt today.

The state government opposed Teesta’s petition, saying that the accused had sought quashing of complaint five years after it was filed.

Government pleader P K Jani submitted that a chargesheet against Setalvad had already been filed and hence the FIR could not be revoked now. Jani further argued that Setalvad, despite summons, failed to appear before the police and did not cooperate with the investigation.

The court observed that the matter was not urgent, and scheduled further hearing for May 24. Setalvad has already obtained anticipatory bail from the court, after she was implicated in the case by one of her former close aides, Rais Khan, who was then associated with her NGO – Citizen for Justice and Peace (CJP).

In 2002, the district administration had buried about 28 unidentified bodies of riot victims from Pandarwada and surrounding villages of Khanpur taluka in a graveyard near river Panam.

After over four year, Rais Khan and 12 others exhumed these bodies without prior permission of the government, to prove that many more bodies had been buried there, and it was in fact a “mass grave” of post-Godhra riot victims. Following this a criminal complaint was registered for alleged destruction of evidence, but the investigation began only last year, as the accused had obtained stay to the probe from the Gujarat High Court.