‘Sadiq Jamal was killed to prevent arrest of top Gujarat cops in Telgi scam’

On January 13,2003,Jamal,a Gujarat riot victim from Bhavnagar,was gunned down by the Ahmedabad Detection of Crime Branch in Naroda. The police claimed Jamal was a Lashkar-e-Toiba operative on a mission to assassinate Narendra Modi,L K Advani and Pravin Togadia.

Tirodkar said: “When I had gone to Dubai,I came across Jamal. He used to work in Tarik Parvin’s office,and had lost his relatives and house in the riots in Gujarat. He held Modi responsible for his losses,and asked me to help him take up his case with the Gujarat Human Rights Commission. Since he had returned to Gujarat and then came to Mumbai,I told Daya that I had found someone who may fit the bill.”

“Daya told me that we needed to do this to earn favours,so that,if necessary,we could prevent the arrests of some IPS officers who would soon get implicated in the Telgi scam. On January 11,a team of the Ahmedabad police posing as rights officials came to the city,and Nayak handed Jamal to them at the Borivili National Park,” Tirodkar alleged. He added that one of the officers in the team was D G Vanzara. “Two days later,I came to know that Jamal had been killed.”

In May 2008,his brother Shabir had filed an application before the Gujarat High Court annexing a copy of Tirodkar’s private complaint before the special Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act court,in which he alleged Jamal was killed in a fake encounter.

Tirodkar is now facing a court trial after he admitted to have taken Rs 5 crore (along with Nayak) from fugitive gangster Chhota Shakeel. The money was taken to bribe higher-ups to transfer police officers who were acting against the underworld.

Tirodkar is currently out on bail,while Nayak is suspended for an offence of disproportionate assets.