A special CBI court on Thursday issued the arrest warrant against additional director general of police P P Pandey,who is an accused in the 2004 Ishrat Jahan encounter case. Pandey,a 1980-batch IPS officer currently posted as Additional DGP in CID (crime),was Ahmedabads Joint Commissioner of Police when Ishrat Jahan and three others were killed in a police encounter on the citys outskirts. Seeking an arrest warrant against Pandey,CBI had argued he had been evading summons to appear before it for questioning in the case. We issued two summons,on April 22 and 24,respectively,but he did not respond. When we went to his residence in Ahmedabad,his adult son refused to give us information about his whereabouts and his official mobile phone is also not reachable, CBI counsel L D Tiwari had argued. The arrest warrant was issued by additional chief judicial magistrate (CBI court) H S Khutwad on the directions of special CBI judge (sessions) Gita Gopi. Khutwad had on April 25 rejected CBIs plea to issue the warrant following which the agency filed a revised petition. While ordering the magistrate to issue a warrant against Pandey,judge Gita Gopi observed,.interference is necessary in the interest of justice.The ACJM is directed to issue warrant of arrest. CBI has arrested six police officers in the case so far,including IPS officer G L Singhal. They all have been charged with illegal confinement,conspiracy and murder of the four alleged LeT operatives. Ishrat Jahan,a 19-year-old college girl from Mumbra,was killed along with her friend Pranesh Pillai alias Javed Sheikh,Zeeshan Johar and Amjad Ali Rana on June 15,2004. After the encounter,the police had said they were LeT operatives on a mission to kill CM Narendra Modi.
