Delhi HC refuses to stay Verma’s dismissal; officer had assisted the Gujarat HC-appointed SIT in the probe of 2004 Ishrat Jahan case.
It’s over.
Gujarat’s real life Singham, who has been fighting a lonely battle against the Narendra Modi government –first in Gujarat and now at the Centre — has no options left.
The Delhi High court, in its verdict on Monday, has refused to grant a stay on his dismissal order. This means Satish Verma, the IPS officer of the Gujarat cadre could be suspended any time now. Verma is currently posted with the CRPF in Coimbatore. He is due to retire on September 30 but as of now, it seems he will be dismissed from services by Tuesday evening, less than three days before retirement.
After the Centre decided to dismiss him from services, Verma had approached the Supreme Court. All he got was a week-long stay to approach the Delhi High Court. On Monday, the Delhi High Court ordered that Verma should not be given further relief, thereby paving the way implementing the Centre’s decision to dismiss him. It will also mean that he will not get any pension or welfare benefits.
STORMY CAREER
The 1986 batch IPS officer has had a bright but tumultuous career. A topper and an IIT and IIM graduate, Verma was known for his no-nonsense policing. He joins the list of other Gujarat cadre IPS officers such as Rahul Sharma, Rajnish Rai, Sanjiv Bhatt, RB Sreekumar and Kuldip Sharma, who have had to face the ire of the government.
In 2002, when Gujarat was in the midst of communal riots, Verma was transferred to Ahmedabad to take charge of the worst-hit areas such as Naroda Patiya, Naroda Gam and Gulberg Society, as part of a major IPS reshuffle affected by former Punjab Police chief KPS Gill, who was brought in to control the violence.
Verma soon found himself dumped to a Special Reserve Police Training Centre in Junagadh after he ordered the arrest of then BJP MLA Shankar Chaudhry in a 2002 riots case wherein two youths were killed. He ordered this arrest as part of the committee set up at the directions of the Supreme Court in 2004-5 to review the 2002 riots cases that had been closed by the Gujarat government without proper redressal.
However, what angered the state government was Verma’s investigation in the Ishrat Jahan case. Verma was part of the SIT constituted by the Gujarat High Court to look into the encounter, and it held that the shootout that led to the death of Mumbai resident Ishrat and three others was a “premeditated custodial killing”.
The Gujarat police had said that 19-year-old Ishrat, from Mumbra, along with her friends, had entered Ahmedabad to kill Chief Minister Modi. It was during these investigations that several personal allegations against the BJP government including the infamous snooping case were unraveled. In November 2011, Verma filed an affidavit in the court stating that several witnesses were being forced to retract testimonies.
Based on the SIT’s report, the high court entrusted the investigation to the CBI in December 2011, directing that it should avail of Verma’s services. In June 2012, Verma approached the high court saying the state government had ordered an inquiry against him headed by then Vadodara Police Commissioner Rakesh Asthana, accusing him of seizing a hard disk from a forensic lab containing evidence pertaining to the Ishrat Jahan encounter which, he said, had been concealed by the lab until then.
In 2016, a special CBI court granted Verma the permission to get a certified copy of the first chargesheet in the case, after Verma pleaded that he believed “a serious and concerted attempt is being made to cause miscarriage of justice, by attempting to negate or weaken the evidences collected in the investigation”. The Gujarat High Court rejected the CBI ruling.
GROUNDS FOR DISMISSAL
Earlier this month, the Ministry of Home Affairs decided to dismiss Verma citing an old case which had been reopened by the Gujarat government for reinvestigation. The case pertained to an encounter of one Jasu Gagan Shiyal in 1996 when Verma was the district superintendent of police (SP) in Porbandar. This case was reopened for investigation in 2012 when Verma began the Ishrat Jahan probe but the Supreme Court in 2013 directed the Gujarat government not to arrest Verma.
In 2014, Verma was posted as chief vigilance officer with NEEPCO in the North-East. Here, he again unearthed a scam allegedly involving senior BJP leader and Union minister Kiran Riiiju. Verma was slapped with three more charges including for giving a media interview.
Verma challenged these departmental chargesheets before the Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT). However, these resulted in ensuring that he was kept away from a promotion. In 2015, Verma was superseded even as the rest of his batch mates were promoted as additional DGP.
From North-East, Verma was transferred to the CRPF at the Central Training College in Coimbatore in October 2017. Earlier this month, the MHA issued him a dismissal order. In the dismissal order, the Centre charged him with giving a statement to media on the Ishrat Jahan encounter in 2016, stating that he “spoke unauthorisedly on the matters which were not within the sphere of his duties at NEEPCO”.
The Centre said such statements by him “had the effect of an adverse criticism of action of the Central government and the state government, which is capable of embarrassing the relations between the Central government and the state government, and which is also capable of affecting the relationship of India with a neighbouring country”.Hours after the Delhi HC verdict, Verma’s family members and friends rallied around him. “Satish Verma served Gujarat with utmost integrity and passion for over 26 years. He is an honest officer who followed the book, the Constitution and did not pay heed to political bosses,” a senior IPS officer told Vibes of India. “India has let down an upright officer. The message that has gone is that this is what happens when you refuse to toe the line of the political bosses”, another officer said.
Also Read: SC gives 7 day stay on Satish Verma’s Dismissal Order
