Extremely upset with David Coleman Headley's statement on Ishrat Jahan, the family members of the 19-year-old girl on Thursday questioned the veracity of the claims made by the 26/11 Mumbai terror attack convict.
Ishrat's uncle Rauf Lala said it's up to the people to decide whether they agree with the CBI report or Headley's claim.
"Attempts were made to link Ishrat's name from Headley. Three names were kept in front of him, he selected one. The CBI has established it in its chargesheet. It has been established in the court that it was not an encounter, but Ishrat Jahan was murdered. Now, the people have to decide if they want to believe the CBI report or David Headley," Lala told ANI.
"We are following this case from the last 10 years. This statement is not new or shocking. David Headley is sitting there and making accusations. The probe agencies must investigate the truth," he added.
Ishrat's uncle further stated that they have full faith on the country's judicial system.
While deposing before the court via video link from an undisclosed location in the United States, Headley said that there was a women's wing in the LeT.
More From This Section
Deposing before the court, Headley claimed that the mastermind of the 2008 Mumbai attack, Zakiur Rehman Lakhvi told him about a botched up operation of Muzammil in India.
"The operation was about shooting the police at some naka. One woman LeT named Ishrat Jahan was involved. Muzammil Bhatt was the head of our group before Sajid Mir," he told the court.
He, however, denied the involvement of any woman suicide bomber in the LeT but later named Ishrat Jahan as an LeT operative.
Early on the morning of 15 June 2004, Ishrat Jahan, Javed Sheikh, Zeeshan Johar and Amjad Ali Rana were shot dead on the road leading to the Kotarpur waterworks on the outskirts of Ahmedabad. The encounter was carried out allegedly by a team led by DIG D.G. Vanjara, who was later jailed for his alleged involvement in the Sohrabuddin Sheikh fake encounter.
The police alleged that Ishrat and her associates were Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) operatives involved in a plot to assassinate the Chief Minister of Gujarat, Narendra Modi. Later, an investigation was launched into the allegations that Ishrat was killed in a fake encounter. After a long investigation, in 2009, an Ahmedabad Metropolitan court ruled that the encounter was staged.
The decision was challenged by the Gujarat State government, and taken to the High Court. On July 3, 2013, the CBI has filed its first chargesheet in an Ahmedabad court saying that the shooting was a staged encounter carried out in cold blood.