The chief secretary had been asked to appear in person today by a May 7 order by a division bench comprising justices Ramesh Sinha and Umesh Chandra Srivastava. In his affidavit, Bhatnagar also stated that the CB-CID, which has been investigating the case registered in connection with the riots, has proposed to submit its closure report and it will be submitted before the trial court.
The development came during hearing of a petition seeking an independent probe into the violence. The petition was filed by Parvez Parwaz, the complainant in the FIR lodged at Cantonment police station of Gorakhpur in connection with the riots and Asad Hayat, a witness in the case. The petitioners moved the high court seeking an investigation into the case by an independent agency. The petitioners’ counsel S F A Naqvi challenged the state government’s stand in declining to grant sanction for the prosecution of the chief minister.
“We challenged the state government’s stand and submitted before the court that the chief secretary happens to be a subordinate of the chief minister, who is himself an accused. “The refusal to grant sanction is tantamount to an accused declining to prosecute himself,” Naqvi told PTI.
Naqvi said the petitioners sought permission to file an application challenging the state government’s order refusing to grant sanction for prosecuting Yogi Adityanath. The court gave permission to do so by the next date of hearing on July 7, he said. However, arguing on behalf of the state government, Advocate General Raghavendra Singh told the court that the case filed in Gorakhpur was “politically motivated” and that it was registered 10 months after the communal riots broke out.
He also informed the court that the decision to refuse grant of sanction for prosecuting the accused was taken by the state’s Principal Secretary (Home) upon the advice of the law department which gave its opinion “on the basis of report of forensic examination of a CD containing hate speeches allegedly given by some of the accused.”
Naqvi said the court was told by the petitioners that Yogi Adityanath has himself, in an interview to a private news channel, which is available on YouTube, “admitted” to having made the alleged incendiary speeches for which he has been named in the FIR lodged at Gorakhpur. “We requested that the court ask for the video recording to get a first-hand account. “The court responded to our submission by asking the state government to file an affidavit on the next date of hearing explaining why a recording of the said interview cannot be submitted,” he added.