After Public Interest Litigation (PIL), a case has been filed against the author and publisher of Who Killed Karkare?. Weeks after the Bombay High Court admitted a PIL seeking investigation in the Karkare murder, a Navi Mumbai-based person has filed a case against both the author and publisher of the book claiming that “the book contains imputations, assertions prejudicial to national integration, statements promoting enmity, hatred between classes/communities and has imputed false allegations against Intelligence Bureau, the Indian judiciary and the government of India.”
Ever since the book was published in October 2009, the press as well as the authorities have slowly started using the term “Hindu Terror” or “Saffron Terror” in their reports and comments. Even the Union Home Minister on August 25 acknowledged their presence. A main premise of Mushrif’s book is that Hindutva terrorists, through their IB contacts, used the 26-11 terrorist attack on Mumbai to kill ATS chief Hemant Karkare who had started unravelling the vast network of Hindutva terror outfits which have effected many terrorists attacks which earlier were assumed to be the handiwork of “Islamic” terrorists.
Since the authorities only summarily probed the Mumbai attacks, Radhakant Yadav, a Patna-based veteran Lohiyaite, first filed a PIL in the Supreme Court to order a probe into this angle. The petition, relying heavily on Mushrif’s book, sought the setting up of a special investigation team to probe this angle. The Apex Court dismissed the petition directing the petitioner to first go to the concerned high court. Accordingly, writ petition No. 2353 of 2010 was filed in Bombay High Court on August 6 (see the text of the writ petition at http://whokilledkarkare.com/content/who-killed-karkare-effect).
The petition says that Intelligence Bureau was aware of November 26, 2008 attacks, and that Abhinav Bharat, in connivance with IB, launched a “parallel operation” at Cama Hospital to kill Karkare. It says that Karkare was deliberately sent to the spot where he and others were ambushed. Yadav further says in his petition that Mumbai Crime Branch, which investigated the attacks, tried “to cover up the identities of victims” of the bomb blast in a taxi at suburban Vile Parle on the same night, because some Abhinav Bharat members were among the dead. Arguing that terrorists Kasab and Ismail were not involved in the attack on Cama Hospital, the petition claimed that their names did not figure in the intercepts of telephone conversations between other Pakistani terrorists (at Taj and Oberoi hotels) and their handlers in Pakistan.
The court bench consisting of judges BH Marlapalle and Anoop Mohta admitted the petition and issued orders on August 17 to the Governments of India and Maharashtra to file their replies within four weeks.
Now, according to a press release issued on September 4 by a Navi Mumbai advocate, one Anway Satpute has filed a case against both the author and publisher of Who Killed Karkare? for the offences under sections 107, 115, 116, 117, 121, 121A , 123, 124A, 153 , 153A , 153B 505, 505(2) , 506 r/w 34 OF I. P. C and under THE NATIONAL SECURITY ACT and under MCOCA. The advocate said in his press release that “the book contained imputations, rumours and or alarming news, which were intentionally published to create alarm and promote feelings of enmity and hatred between communities on the ground of their caste and religion and were intended to arouse anti-national feelings in the minds of its readers.”
The court, according to the lawyer’s press release, directed Police to register an FIR and investigate the matter under section 156(3) of CRPC against S.M. Mushrif, a former Inspector General of Police, Maharashtra and Pharos Media & Publishing Pvt. Ltd.
[The writer is Editor of The Milli Gazette]