Ishrat SIT grills jail cop DG Vanzara for four hours

Suspended IPS officer DG Vanzara was questioned in the Sabarmati jail for over four hours on Wednesday by a team of the SIT constituted by the Gujarat high court to investigate the Ishrat Jahan encounter case.

Further, Ishrat SIT is all set for another round of forensic analysis by a team of experts from Delhi which has reached Ahmedabad for this purpose. Vanzara was questioned for over four hours by the Ishrat SIT team headed by a deputy superintendent of police.

This is the third encounter case - after the Sohrab and Tulsi encounter cases - in which Vanzara has faced questioning. He is currently incarcerated in Sabarmati jail as an accused in the Sohrabuddin Sheikh encounter case.

A source said that Vanzara was questioned especially to verify the authenticity of the statements made by IPS officer PP Pande on Tuesday.

Sources claimed that during his questioning, Pande had, more or less, stuck to the FIR filed in the case by the detection of crime branch. "Hence, Vanzara was questioned especially to cross-check the statements made by Pande," a source said on the condition of anonymity.

Meanwhile, a team from the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) in Delhi reached the city on Wednesday evening, while another team from the Central Forensic Science Laboratory (CFSL) is expected to reach the city on Thursday.

Sources said that all the forensic analysis in connection with the Ishrat case will be done in the next 2-3 days. The forensic team might, for the second time, reconstruct the scene of crime near the Kotarpur waterworks. 

The team had come to the city once earlier too and had reconstructed the scene of crime with IPS officer GL Singhal and DySP Tarun Barot present during the entire exercise.

Ishrat SIT has to submit a progress report in the Gujarat high court on July 14 when the court will also decide on a new name for the post of chairman of Ishrat SIT.