2002 Gujarat riots: Communal violence is like lava, leaves ground fertile for future revenge, Kapil Sibal tells SC

While arguing for Zakia Jafri, widow of former Congress MP Ehsan Jafri, Senior advocate Kapil Sibal told the Supreme Court that communal violence is institutionalized violence and is like lava erupting from a volcano that scars the ground it touches.

New Delhi: Senior advocate Kapil Sibal on Wednesday told the Supreme Court that communal violence is institutionalized violence and is like lava erupting from a volcano that scars the ground it touches. Sibal's remarks came while arguing for Zakia Jafri, widow of former Congress MP Ehsan Jafri, challenging the clean chit given by the SIT to Prime Minister Narendra Modi and several others in the 2002 Gujarat riots.

"My concern is really for the future. Let me put it in colourful terms. Communal violence is like lava erupting from a volcano and it is institutionalized violence. Whenever the lava touches a ground on earth it scars it and it becomes a fertile ground for future revenge. I lost my maternal grandparents to it in Pakistan. I am a victim of the same," Sibal told a bench headed by Justice AM Khanwilkar.

Sibal said he is not accusing anyone but a message must be sent to the world that "violence in the name of religion will not be tolerated".

Representing Jafri in the case, Sibal said the Special Investigation Team (SIT) did not conduct a proper investigation and the official records of the SIT would prove the same.

"SIT never seized any phones, never checked call data records, never checked how bombs were manufactured and it never took stock of the accused whereabouts. so whichever way you look at it, there has to be an investigation," he further argued.

Arguments in the case will continue tomorrow.

Ehsan Jafri was among 69 people killed in the Gulbarg Society massacre.

The SIT, appointed by the apex court, had conducted the investigation into the case and gave a clean chit to then Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi, other top politicians, and bureaucrats. The clean chit was given citing a lack of "prosecutable evidence" against them.

Challenging the Gujarat High Court's order dated October 5, 2017, that upheld SIT's clean chit, Zakia approached the Supreme Court alleging a "larger conspiracy" in the riots. The Gujarat High Court had upheld the magisterial court's order, accepting the SIT's closure report.

Earlier, Zakia had approached the Gujarat High Court in 2014 after the magisterial court rejected the petition challenging the SIT report. In her petition to the Supreme Court, Zakia stated, "Grant ad-interim order to Special Investigation Team (SIT) to carry out a further investigation under section 173(8) of Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC) in regard to the petitioner's complaint dated June 8, 2006, and the evidence placed before the learned through the protest petition dated April 15, 2013."

ANI