Impartial judicial scrutiny urged for India terror investigations

Mumbai: An impartial judicial monitoring of all terror investigations by the Supreme Court is the need of the hour, say prominent citizens.

"We've been seeing several lapses in the investigation process and therefore need a watchdog at every step," said Javed Akhtar, lyricist, poet and script writer and a member of the Citizens for Justice and Peace (CJP).

"Recent developments have shown undue pressure and politicisation of the law and order machinery into terror/blast investigations," he added.

At a press conference held by members of the CJP - Mahesh Bhat, Anil Dharker, Teesta Setalvad and Javed Akhtar - all said that judicial monitoring should be developed to not just check police bias but to help and facilitate the honest police officer into doing his job.

Setalvad, who has been instrumental in exposing several cases of injustice meted out to victims of terror and communal riots, said, "The absence of such a non-partisan judicial monitor has succeeded in limiting and influencing of the prosecution of the guilty and has, in fact prevented the real guilty from being brought to book."

The CJP demands that the central government appoint a sitting three-member tribunal of Supreme Court judges to oversee all terror-related investigations.

With outfits related to extremist and political outfits claiming to speak on behalf of Hinduism and Islam allegedly behind the terror attacks, it is time issues like the dangerous leakages of explosive substances like RDX, gelatine sticks and ammonium nitrate should come under scrutiny.

"These substances are governed, monitored and controlled strictly under different legislations and yet are being leaked - even from the Indian Army and Border Security Force control - and finding themselves in the market," says Setalvad.

Recent newspaper reports have indicated how gelatine sticks can be bought for Rs50 (Dh13.80) from tribals barely 50 kilometres from Mumbai and how after the 2008 Ahmedabad blasts the state government stated that the leak of gelatine sticks and explosives was from a Rajasthan Dholpur factory.