Conduct of CRPF IG who reported Assam encounter ‘fake’ to be probed

NEW DELHI: Former secretary (internal security) and current advisor to the home ministry Ashok Prasad has been asked to carry out an inquiry into the conduct of CRPF Inspector General who has lodged complaint about an alleged fake encounter in Assam.

Prasad told HT that two probes are already looking into the incident of encounter – one by the Assam police and another in the form of a magisterial inquiry.

“My inquiry will mainly focus on the procedural aspects of the report given by the officer concerned. I am not conducting any probe into the incident of encounter,” said Prasad.

CRPF Inspector General Rajnish Rai, a 1992 batch Indian Police Service officer of the Gujarat cadre, filed a report with the CRPF claiming an encounter conducted by a joint team of the Assam police, the army, the CRPF and the SSB on March 29-30 in Chirang district of Assam was fake.

It was claimed that two suspect cadres of insurgent group NDFB(S) were killed in the encounter. But Rai, who was then posted in Northeast as IG of the CRPF, conducted his own ‘discreet’ inquiry into the encounter and submitted a report alleging that the killings were ‘pre-planned murders’.

A home ministry official said as part of the probe into ‘procedural aspects’, Prasad will see whether Rai had the legal authority to conduct an inquiry into the encounter and whether he exceeded his authority by sharing his report outside the CRPF.

“If required, I may go to Assam,” Prasad said.

Earlier this week, Rai was transferred from the Northeast to the CRPF’s Counter Insurgency and Anti-Terrorism School in Chittoor of Andhra Pradesh.

Rai, during his posting in Gujarat, also probed encounter killing of alleged gangster Sohrabuddin Sheikh that led to arrest of many IPS officers.