The Supreme Court on Wednesday extended the stay of the Gujarat High Court order denying regular bail to social activist Teesta Setalvad – accused of conspiring and forging material to allege inaction by the State machinery at the top echelon to curb and control the riots that had engulfed the State after the burning of coach S-6 of Sabarmati Express at Godhra railway Station in which 59 people died in 2002.
Extending the stay of the Gujarat High court order refusing regular bail to Teesta Setalvad and time to challenge it before the Supreme Court, a bench of Justice B.R. Gavai, Justice A.S. Bopanna and Justice Dipankar Datta issued notice to Gujarat government on Teesta Setalvad’s plea and posted the matter for hearing on July 19, 2023.
While senior advocate Kapil Sibal urged the court to hear the matter urgently, Additional Solicitor General V.S. Raju appearing for the State government said that they needed time to translate some documents which were in Gujarati.
ASG Raju had appeared along with Solicitor General Tushar Mehta.
“We will hear it on July 19. Interim order (protecting Teesta) to continue,” the bench ordered.
In the meantime, the bench asked the parties to file and exchange their pleadings before July 15, 2023. The court allotted one hour each to both the sides to commence and conclude their respective arguments.
On July 1, 2023, a special bench comprising Justice Gavai, Justice Bopanna and Justice Datta, constituted to hear Teesta Setalvad’s plea, had stayed the High Court’s order refusing her bail and not giving her time to approach the Supreme Court challenging it.
Staying the single judge order, the top court had noted in its July 1, order that the FIR against Teesta was registered on June 25, 2022, she was arrested by the Gujarat police and was granted interim bail by the top court on September 2, 2022.
The bench said that one of the factors that weighed with the top court in releasing Teesta on interim bail on September 2, 2022, was that being a lady she was entitled special protection under Section 437 of the Code of Criminal Procedure (Cr.P.C.)
Stating that the Single Judge of the High Court ought to have granted at least some protection so that the Teesta Setalvad had sufficient time to challenge the order before this Supreme Court, the bench on July 1 had said that the “Single Judge was not correct in granting even some protection…”
Taking a dim view of the high court order denying Teesta Setalvad bail and asking her to surrender, the top court today said it should not have been lost that she was on interim bail granted by the top court since September 2, 20223.
Questioning the “alarming urgency” that the single judge denied Teesta Setalvad a week’s time to appeal against the order rejecting her plea for regular bail, Justice Gavai heading the bench had on July 1, observed that “In our opinion the single judge was totally wrong in not giving (her)n interim protection”.
The matter reached the three-judge bench after earlier in the evening on July 1, 2023, a two-judge bench comprising Justice Abhay S. Oka and Justice Prashant Kumar Mishra differed on the grant of relief to Teesta Setalvad.
Setalvad was arrested by the Gujarat Police on June 25, 2022, – a day after Supreme Court on June 24 delivered a judgment upholding Special Investigation Team report giving a clean chit to then Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi who was blamed for allegedly asking the top ranking officer in the administration and the police to let people vent to their anger in the wake burning of a coach S-6 of Sabarmati Express train at Godhra Station on February 27, 2002, resulting in the death of 59 people.
The allegation against the Gujarat government also included that of larger conspiracy, police inaction and the targeting of the Muslims.
While praising the “indefatigable work done” by the SIT in the “challenging circumstance” and coming out with “flying colours unscathed”, the top court in its June 24, 2022, judgment had said, “At the end of the day, it appears to us that a coalesced effort of the disgruntled officials of the State of Gujarat along with others was to create sensation by making revelations which were false to their own knowledge. The falsity of their claims had been fully exposed by the SIT after a thorough investigation.”
Stating that the attempt was to “to keep the pot boiling, obviously, for ulterior design”, the top court had said, “As a matter of fact, all those involved in such abuse of process, need to be in the dock and proceeded with in accordance with law.”
Setalvad was arrested on an FIR registered by the Ahmedabad Detection of Crime Branch (DCB) after the top court judgment on charges of allegedly conspiring to falsely implicate innocent people in connection with the 2002 Gujarat riots.
Charges were framed against her under sections 468 (forgery for cheating) and 194 (fabricating false evidence with intent to procure conviction for capital offenses) of the Indian Penal Code.
Besides Setalvad, others alleged to be part of the conspiracy included former DGP R.B. Sreekumar, x-IPS officer Sanjiv Bhat and former State Home Minister late Haren Pandeya.
The top court judgment had come on a petition by Zakia Jafri who had questioned the SIT report giving clean chit to Modi and had refuted the allegation of inaction by the State administration and the police during the riots.
Zakia Jafri is the widow of former Congress member of parliament Ehsan Jafri who along with others was killed by the violent mob at Gulberg Society on February 28, 2002, during Gujarat riots. Teesta had joined Zakia Jafri in the case in the Supreme Court.