Activist Teesta Setalvad has alleged that the complaint filed against her, for allegedly usurping Rs 1.51 crore collected for turning Gulbarg Society into a museum, is a part of sinister campaign to derail the Zakia Jafri protest petition against Narendra Modi and others.
Yesterday, city crime branch had registered an FIR against Setalvad, her husband Javed Anand, Zakia Jafri's son Tanvir Jafri and two others for allegedly usurping Rs 1.51 crore for turning Gulbarg society into a museum.
Setalwad's organisation Citizens for Justice and Peace (CJP) wrote a letter to JCP crime branch of the city A K Sharma, alleging the FIR appears to be part of a sinister campaign being unleashed against them by some persons being manipulated by a former employee Rais Khan Pathan, who is using some residents of the society (not official members) and sections of the police and some persons claiming to be official members of the society.
"(the complaint against us) is based on developments that have been in the public domain and have been clearly aimed at derailing the Zakia Jafri protest petition against Narendra Modi and others," the letter said.
"We would like to state categorically that both Citizens for Justice and Peace (CJP) and Sabrang Trust officially received money for legitimate activities and following the legally required procedures," it mentioned.
"By unleashing this set of manipulated lies and using sections of the police towards this end, the dubious nexus of these persons with a former employee and the powerful in Gujarat are trying to derail the proposed protest petition," Teesta's organisation CJP said.
"We, therefore, urge that the Crime Branch of the Gujarat Police to look at the complete background and nexus when it deals with the current set of false allegations," CJP said.
"We would like to reiterate that our organisation(s) function lawfully and urge that this malafide complaint is not made a manipulative tool by the Crime Branch. Our trustees would gladly respond to any genuine investigations or inquiries," the organisation said in a letter to Crime Branch.
The complaint was filed eleven days after a metropolitan magistrate's court rejected Zakia Jafri's protest petition against Modi and 62 others.
Rais Khan was a former employee of Setalwad's CJP who had some problem with her on financial issues and dissociated from her.
