ഇന്ത്യയെ ഞെട്ടിച്ച പാർലമെൻ്റ് ആക്രമണം | അഫ്സൽ ഗുരുവിൻ്റെ വിചാരണ|BSChandra Mohan |Mlife daily

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Indian Parliament attack | Investigation story

Not surprisingly, the hanging of Afzal Guru has stirred up quite a controversy. There are several reasons for this. The matter had been kept pending for so long that when the decision was finally taken, from the timing and the manner in which it was executed, it seemed to large sections of the people that it was cynically guided by political considerations. The secrecy that surrounded the event, where even his wife and family came to know about it through the media after the act, and the fact that Afzal Guru did not get a chance to challenge the president’s rejection of his mercy petition suggest that the Congress did not want to take any chances. Was it such an open and shut case against Afzal Guru?

It doesn’t help that what transpired with respect to the other co-accused in the Parliament attack case—SAR Geelani, Shaukat Hussain Guru and his wife, Afsan Guru—establish a telling contrast. Also sentenced to death by a special POTA court on charges of conspiring in the attack, the Delhi High Court subsequently acquitted Geelani and Afsan Guru. According to published reports, the high court said the evidence on which the lower court relied on convicting Geelani did not stand up to scrutiny. The court determined that the prosecution had failed “to bring on record evidence, which cumulatively forms a chain, so complete that there is no escape from the conclusion that in all human probabilities Geelani was involved in the conspiracy”. So, from death to complete acquittal it went. In the case of Afsan Guru, who had been sentenced to five years rigorous imprisonment (RI) on the lesser charge of concealing knowledge of the conspiracy, the court determined that “even the offence that she had knowledge of the conspiracy and failed to report it to the police is not established”. As for Shaukat, the Supreme Court modified the death sentence and gave him ten years RI. He was set free in December 2010, nine months before his term ended—on account of good conduct.

The Seizures Continued: The seized laptop, the police said, contained the files that created the fake home ministry pass and the fake identity cards. It contained no other useful information. They claimed that Afzal was carrying it to Srinagar in order to return it to Ghazi Baba. The Investigating Officer, ACP Rajbir Singh, said that the hard disk of the computer had been sealed on January 16, 2002 (a whole month after the seizure). But the computer shows that it was accessed even after that date. The courts have considered this but taken no cognisance of it. (On a speculative note, isn't it strange that the only incriminating information found on the computer were the files used to make the fake passes and ID cards? And a Zee TV film clip showing the Parliament Building. If other incriminating information had been deleted, why wasn't this? And why did Ghazi Baba, Chief of Operations of an international terrorist organisation, need a laptop – with bad artwork on it— so urgently?)

Consider the Mobile phone call records: Stared at for long enough, a lot of the 'hard evidence' produced by the Special Cell begins to look dubious. The backbone of the prosecution's case has to do with the recovery of mobile phones, SIM cards, computerised call records, and the testimonies of officials from cellphone companies and shopkeepers who sold the phones and SIM cards to Afzal and his accomplices. The call records that were produced to show that Shaukat, Afzal , Geelani and Mohammad (one of the dead militants) had all been in touch with each other very close to the time of the attack were uncertified computer printouts, not even copies of primary documents. They were outputs of the billing system stored as text files that could have been easily doctored and at any time. For example, the call records that were produced show that two calls had been made at exactly the same time from the same SIM card, but from separate handsets with separate IMEI numbers. This means that either the SIM card had been cloned or the call records were doctored.

Consider the SIM card: To prop up its version of the story, the prosecution relies heavily on one particular mobile phone number – 9811489429. The police say it was Afzal's number – the number that connected Afzal to Mohammad, Afzal to Shaukat, and Shaukat to Geelani. The police also say that this number was written on the back of the identity tags found on the dead terrorists. Pretty convenient. Lost Kitten! Call Mom at 9811489429. (It's worth mentioning that normal procedure requires evidence gathered at the scene of a crime to be sealed.

The ID cards were never sealed and remained in the custody of the police and could have been tampered with at any time.)