Unlikely spies, improbable encounters

The February 4, 2007, shootout by Delhi Police near Connaught Place may have been a fake

NEW DELHI: India’s war on terror has resulted in some bizarre cases. A recent Central Bureau of Investigation inquiry, reported in detail by DNA earlier, had accused the Special Cell of framing two of its informers as terrorists.

And in another case, reported by DNA recently, the J&K Police has claimed that Haji Ghulam Mohinuddin, who was ‘arrested’ as a dreaded terrorist planning to attack the Delhi airport, is actually a prized informer of theirs.

The Delhi police had claimed that Dar was arrested along with three others after an encounter while they were planning to mount a major attack on the Indira Gandhi International airport. The J&K Police has officially written to the trial court countering the Delhi police claim, and standing by its informer.

DNA investigations now reveal that the latest ‘encounter’ on a flyover in the Capital in February, in which four Jaish-e-Mohammed terrorists were arrested may have been fake. The police had said that it engaged the terrorists in a fierce encounter close to Inter Continental Hotel, stone’s throw away from Connaught Place on February 4, 2007.

Police said three terrorists got down from the Malwa Express and walked towards Deen Dayal Upadhyay Marg to hand over explosives to another terrorist, Shahid Gafoor.

They were surrounded by a 35-member police team and asked to surrender. Gafoor fired at the police party. Nearly 20 rounds were fired in the gun battle, seven by Gafoor (from his .30 bore pistol) and 13 rounds by Delhi Police, following which the alleged terrorists were arrested. The police also ‘recovered’ three kilograms of RDX from the terrorists.

An investigation was carried out by the special cell and samples of the seized explosives were sent for forensic examination along with the pistol which was used by Gafoor to fire at police party and 20 empties.

What is surprising is that police found only empties and no used bullets from the spot. Secondly, while the weapon of the accused, bullet proof jackets used by police, and bullet empties recovered from the spot were sent for examination, no police weapon was sent to the lab.

In a report on March 29, 2007, the Central Forensic Science Laboratory punched a hole in the case, saying it couldn’t conclusively give an opinion. The lab said, the “five holes observed on the four bullet proof jackets … could have been caused by the passage of .30 bullets fired from beyond powder range of the fire-arm/s”.

In a recent report the CFSL has raised further questions. The CFSL after examining the holes in the bullet-proof jackets of policemen and some fragments of bullets found embedded in the holes, said that a “…definitive opinion could not be given on the fragmented pieces of fired bullets which were recovered from the bullet proof jackets marked BP-1 to BP-4, because these fragments are very small”.

There are several other questions: Why weren’t any policemen hurt in the firing? Why didn’t the Delhi police send its own weapons to the CFSL?

Habib Ibrahim Rahmatullah, an Omani, landed up in Jaipur in December 2003 to visit his second wife Sunita who was pregnant. His first wife is a Pakistani. Rahmatullah had entered India from Nepal, without a visa.

He later told a trial court that a travel agent in Kathmandu had said there was no visa requirement to enter India from Nepal. This is true for Nepali and Indian citizens.

A few weeks later, in January 2004, Rahmatullah was arrested by the Jaipur police who claimed he was a Pakistani spying for the ISI. They booked him under the draconian Official Secrets Act and threw him in jail.  Last year, a local court has acquitted Rahmatullah under the OSA and said the investigation was seriously flawed.

It did, however, convict him under the Foreigners Act for staying in the country without a visa. The police team that arrested Rahmatullah in Rajasthan in January 2004 had initially booked him under only the Foreigners Act.

Within days, the police detected a spy in him. They said they had seized a “Pakistani passport” and photographs of “sensitive military establishments” in various Indian cities including Gwalior, Jodhpur, Jaipur and claimed to have evidence that he made calls to Pakistan. They also claimed that he had applied for an Indian driving licence in Madhya Pradesh.

The Pakistani passport which investigating agencies in Rajasthan claimed they had seized from him was never produced in court. The police only produced a photocopy of what they claimed was the original passport.

The investigating agencies also could not establish that the “suspicious” calls he had made to Pakistan were for passing defence secrets and that he was working as a spy for Pakistan. In court Rahmatullah claimed the calls he made to Pakistan were to his first wife.

It could not be established beyond doubt that the photographs seized from him were of  a sensitive nature. One of them showed his wife Sunita standing next to a dummy aircraft in an air force establishment in Rajasthan. In another, she is standing with some cadets in a Defence museum.

Rahmatullah is currently lodged in a Rajasthan jail serving a five-year sentence under the Foreigners Act. He has gone in appeal against the lower court’s order. The State government has also gone in appeal against the lower court’s order acquitting him under OSA. His son Ibrahim was recently in India to expedite his father’s case.