Lapses and omissions revealed, 15 arrested: A month after Rajkot fire

On Monday, Shaktisinh Gohil, president of Gujarat Pradesh Congress Committee (GPCC), addressed a press conference in Rajkot, appealing to the residents of the city to keep their business and offices closed till Tuesday noon and join the party in the strike it has called for “to seek justice” for the fire incident victims. “Twenty-fifth June will mark one month since that incident which happened on May 25 and we request, not as party of any political stunt or battle but in the name of humanity, Rajkot remain shut completely for half-a-day tomorrow,” Gohil said, adding, “We are calling for a half-day strike as there are people who need to work daily for their daily bread and we don’t want to inconvenience them.”

Meanwhile, the SIT of Rajkot city police has found that Nitin Ramani, a corporator of the ruling BJP in the RMC, had been in touch with one of the owners of the game zone Prakash Hiran alias Prakash Jain whose uncle approached him seeking help in regularisation of the game zone under the Impact Fee Act. Hiran was among those killed in the blaze on May 25.

GPCC president Shanktisinh Gohil and Gujarat Congress working president Jignesh Mevani at a press conference in Rajkot on Monday. (Express Photo)

Bharat Basiya, Assistant Commissioner of Police, Rajkot Crime Branch, who is heading the SIT, told The Indian Express, “Those whose statements we have recorded include around 25 officers and employees of RMC, a couple of officers of the Roads and Buildings Department of the state government and around seven staff member of the Rajkot city police.”

Ramani’s statement was recorded after it emerged that he was in contact with Prakash Hiran alias Prakash Jain, one of the six owners of the TRP Game Zone, police say. Ramani had told reporters that Hiran’s uncle had approached him with a request to help Hiran get the TRP Game Zone’s tin shed housing indoor games facilities regularised and that he had suggested that the owners should apply for its regularisation under the Impact Fee Act. He also told the media that he had given Hiran a reference of an architect for filing the application.

The SIT has arrested the other five TRP Game Zone owners – Yuvrajsinh Solanki, Rahul Rathod, Dhaval Thakkar, Kiritsinh Jadeja and Ashoksinh Jadeja – as well as TRP Game Zone manager Nitin Jain and Mahesh Rathod, Rahul’s uncle, who had got a contract to fabricate another shed at the game zone for creating a snow park, and was supervising welding work when welding sparks allegedly caused the fire, as per the investigators.

Hiran was among the six owners of the gaming zone named as an accused in an FIR registered under Section 304 and others. However, it was later revealed that he was killed in the blaze.

Rajkot’s chief fire officer Ilesh Kher, his deputy Bhikha Theba, Kalavad Road fire station officer Rohit Vigora, Rajkot town planner MD Sagathiya, and his assistants Mukesh Makwana, Gautam Joshi, Rajesh Makwana and Jaydip Chaudhary, an assistant engineer in town planning department of the RMC, are also among those arrested.

The RMC officers have been arrested for alleged acts of omission by not acting against the TRP Game Zone despite knowing it that it didn’t have due clearances from the town planning and fire and emergency services departments and allegedly forging documents post the fire. Kher and Theba are presently in custody of the SIT while the rest of them are in judicial custody.

Sagathiya was also booked by the Rajkot Crime Branch in a separate offence for forging a minutes book of his office on May 27, two days after the incident.

“He forged the minutes book to create false records that he had conducted meetings. That minutes book is not directly related to the case of fire. Therefore, a separate offence was registered against him while Rajesh Makwana and Chaudhary forged records pertaining to the TRP Game Zone. Therefore, they were arrested in the case with other accused,” Basiya said, adding that Sagathiya was sent to judicial custody by a local court after his remand ended on Monday.

The Gujarat Anti-Corruption Bureau has also registered corruption cases against Sagathiya and Theba for allegedly possessing assets disproportionate to their known sources of income. The cases against them came following ACB searches at their offices and residences days after the fire.

Amid protests by the Opposition after the blaze, family members of around a dozen victims have joined demonstrations organised by Congress, including a three-day-long hunger strike, to demand justice for victims. Some of them also interacted with Rahul Gandhi and extended their support to the call of general strike.

On Monday, Gohil alleged that the high-level SIT formed by the state government under chairmanship of IPS officer Subhash Trivedi and which also includes IAS officer Banchhanidhi Pani and chief fire officer of Ahmedabad, “was an attempt to cover up the incident”.

“It has happened repeatedly in such incidents. How long has it been since the Morbi (suspension bridge collapse) incident? SIT did a probe and that kept hitting headlines. But SIT report didn’t become a part of the chargesheet; and as someone who has done a masters in law from this city, can say that court can’t take on record something which is not part of the chargesheet,” Gohil said adding, “People don’t expect to get justice in the Takshashila fire incident in Surat and Harni boat tragedy in Vadodara as people have lost trust in the very government they had voted to power.”

GPCC working president Jignesh Mevani, Congress Seva Dal’s national chief organiser Lalji Desai and others on Monday evening raised slogans outside the office of Rajkot City Police Commissioner Brajesh Kumar Jha, alleging that police had sought a list of those who had extended their support to Tuesday’s strike. Jha could not be contacted for a response.