Forensic experts, probe officials reconstruct Ishrat Jahan shootout in Ahmedabad

Ahmedabad, Oct 22(ANI): A team of forensic experts and investigation officials on Saturday reconstructed the Ishrat Jahan shootout in Ahmedabad to look into key details of the killing.

Recreating the scene of the incident on a highway on the outskirts of the city, probe officials even placed a dilapidated vehicle marking the car in which Jahan and her associates were gunned down, in a bid to ascertain whether the shootout was indeed, genuine.

The Crime Branch of Gujarat Police had killed Jahan, an alleged operative of the Lashkar-e-Taiba, in a fierce shootout in 2004 in Ahmedabad.

According to the police, Jahan and her accomplices were involved in a sinister plot to assassinate Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi.

However, widely believed as fake, the shootout sparked a fierce public and political outcry and was unequivocally condemned by academics, civil society activists, journalists and political leaders, who demanded justice for Jahan.

Interestingly, a metropolitan court in Ahmedabad ruled in 2009 that Jahan's shootout was 'fake,' pricking holes in the sequence of events provided by the police and renewing demands for a fresh probe into the incident.

Presently, a Special Investigation Team (SIT) appointed by the Supreme Court is handling the case.

Former director of Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) R K Raghavan heads the squad. (ANI)