Why government wanted to keep Headley out of 26/11 trial
February 16, 2011 16:49 IST
As the Bombay high court gears up to give the final verdict on the confirmation of death sentence awarded to lone surviving 26/11 terrorist Mohammad Ajmal Kasab on February 21, a key question arises of what happened to the case of David Coleman Headley.
During the appeal before the high court, various pleas were made before the bench to prosecute Headley, who has confessed to his role in the terror attacks that left 166 people dead in Mumbai. However, these pleas were turned down and the HC decided to proceed with the appeal against the order of the 26/11 trial court that had sentenced Kasab to death while acquitting Fahim Ansari and Sabahuddin Ahmed, alleged Lashkar-e-Tayiba operatives.
Sources now tell rediff.com that there was a deliberate ploy on behalf of the home ministry to keep Headley out of the case for now. The proof of the same is a Letter Rogatory (Letter of Request) from the district court that was sent to the home ministry way back in September 2010. However, this letter from the Chicago district court was not sent to the special court since it felt that it would add to the complexities of the ongoing trial.
A Letter Rogatory is a communication a court sends to a foreign court for judicial assistance. It goes through diplomatic channels making the process lengthy.
Sources say that there are two reasons why the Letter Rogatary had not been sent to the special court. One is that the National Investigating Agency was still probing the case and secondly this letter would mean that the Headley angle had to be included in the trial, which would further delay the verdict against Kasab. The Indian government at no point wanted to put the Kasab trial on hold, in fact they wanted to expedite it.
However, with the high court now readying itself to pronounce its verdict against Kasab on Monday, the trial against Headley is expected to commence soon. The Letter Rogatory has now reached the trial court and sources say that it was received on February 6. This would mean that the case against Headley will have to be taken into account and documents pertaining to Headley collected by Indian investigators or that which have cropped up during the course of the trial will have to be shared with the United States.
In this letter, the US has sought videos, voice samples of terrorists, photographs, the judgments in this case and also the ballistic reports. Once the court takes cognisance of the letter, the NIA too will have to act fast and provide the material that is being sought for. The NIA is yet to file a chargesheet and may now do it sooner since the trial against Headley can be conducted independently. Filing a chargesheet while the Kasab trial was ongoing would have created a diversion and delayed the verdict, said sources.
The NIA too faces a few problems pertaining to the Headley case. They will have to file a chargesheet in his absence since his plea bargain does not permit extradition. In addition to this they still have to ascertain the nationality of members of the 313 brigade, who could have helped Headley during his operation in India. Once these issues are sorted out a chargesheet can be expected from the NIA against Headley.
Vicky Nanjappa
