The Supreme Court order allowing the SIT to probe Narendra Modi’s role in the post-Godhra riots delivers a blow to the BJP.

SAM PANTHAKY/AFP Chief Minister Narendra Modi in Gandhinagar on August 2.

After seven year of arrogant confidenc, the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party in Gujarat is now nervously looking over its shoulder. Chief Minister Narendra Modi seems a little wary after the Supreme Court gave the green signal to the Special Investigation Team (SIT) to question him and a few others regarding the 2002 post-Godhra riots.

On April 27, the Supreme Court ordered the SIT “to take steps as required in law” to probe a complaint that Modi, his Cabinet colleagues, senior police officials and bureaucrats had orchestrated the post-Godhra communal riots. The order was in response to a petition filed by Zakia Jaffrey and the Citizens for Justice and Peace. Zakia Jaffrey was seeking justice for her husband and former Congress Member of Parliament Ehsan Jaffrey and 39 others who were killed in Ahmedabad’s Gulberg Housing Society during the riots. The complaint also alleged that those who deposed before the Justice Nanavati Commission that was inquiring into the riots had been encouraged to give false evidence by Modi and other senior officials.

Zakia Jaffrey had initially sent the complaint to the then Gujarat Director-General of Police, but he did not register a first information report (FIR). Zakia Jaffrey then approached the Gujarat High Court, but it dismissed her petition saying there was insufficient evidence to back her allegations. The Supreme Court gave its order to the SIT in April to probe her complaint.

Kalu Maliwad, a former BJP MLA who had been acquitted in one of the riot cases but remains an accused in Zakia Jaffrey’s complaint, objected to the SIT’s right to question Modi and demanded a stay on the proceedings. Maliwad said the Supreme Court had asked the SIT to “look into” the complaint only and this did not constitute an investigation. He also demanded disclosure of the SIT’s confidential report on the riots, which was submitted to the Supreme Court as part of the ongoing investigations.

However, Justice D.H. Waghela of the Gujarat High Court dismissed Maliwad’s petition, calling it “ill-founded and misconceived”. He said: “It is clear from the reading of the apex court order that it contains a direction for (the) SIT and it will take any step required so as to give its report to the apex court.” The SIT, led by former Central Bureau of Investigation Director R.K. Raghavan, has time until December 31 to complete its investigation into Zakia Jaffrey’s complaint and an additional probe into nine other sensitive riot cases.