Ishrat case: CBI grills IB Special Director, summons ex-DGP

CBI today questioned for the second time Intelligence Bureau(IB) Special Director Rajinder Kumar in the Ishrat Jahan fake encounter case amid a bitter row between the two agencies over the probe into the incident.
The CBI, meanwhile, summoned former DGP of Gujarat K R Kaushik tomorrow for questioning in connection with the case.
CBI sources said Kumar, who was head of Gujarat unit of the IB in 2004 when the encounter took place, was grilled for four hours regarding his alleged role in the conspiracy to carry out the strike in which 19-year-old Ishrat Jahan and three others were killed.

They said Kaushik, a 1972-batch IPS officer who was the Commissioner of Police in Ahmedabad at the time of the encounter, has been summoned tomorrow for another round of questioning. He has been quizzed earlier also.
The sources said the CBI has evidence indicating that Kumar was one of the officers who had interrogated Ishrat when she was allegedly taken into illegal custody by Gujarat Police before being killed in the staged encounter.
They said the officer was questioned at length with regard to the alleged interrogation and other inputs which suggest his role in the conspiracy leading to the encounter.

The sources also said during questioning, Kumar was evasive and continuously repeated that he did not remember specific points about the incident as it happened nine years ago.
This is the second time the IB officer has been grilled by CBI sleuths probing his suspected role in the fake encounter in which Ishrat was killed along with three others on June 15, 2004 allegedly by a team of Crime Branch officials on the outskirts of Ahmedabad.
Sources said Kumar, a 1979-batch IPS officer of Manipur- Tripura cadre, had allegedly generated intelligence input that a group of Lashkar terrorists are coming to Ahmedabad to target Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi.