Days after eight SIMI men who escaped from the Bhopal central prison were killed in controversial police action, the Madhya Pradesh government has ordered a judicial probe into the sensational jail-break and the alleged encounter giving into the opposition's demand.
Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan ordered the probe, which will be conducted by retired High Court Judge Justice S K Pandey, an official release issued late Thursday night in Bhopal said.
"Justice Pandey will probe all aspects related to how SIMI activists escaped from the high security jail and the encounter that took place after that," it said.
The purported audio tape about conversation related to the encounter will also be part of overall investigation, a senior police official said.
The tape, which has gone viral on social media, states that the policemen on job were getting instructions from control room to 'bump them off' and khel khatam ho gaya (game is over now).
The purported conversation took place on the day of the encounter and it was recorded and released on social media.
The state government had earlier announced a probe by an SIT comprising CID officers into the encounter and a separate investigation by former Director General of Police Nandan Dubey into the jailbreak but Congress and other opposition parties had been pressing for a judicial probe.
State Home Minister Bhupendra Singh on Friday said Pandey will also give his recommendations on improving security in prisons. The BJP government led by Chouhan has vociferously defended the police action and accused the opposition of "politicising and communalising" the issue.
The party on Friday said that the judicial inquiry has been ordered as the state government has nothing to hide.
"I don't think there was any inquiry necessary but since Shivraj Chouhan has nothing to hide so he agreed to a judicial probe, which was their demand," BJP MP Subramanian Swamy said.
Reacting to the announcement of the probe, Congress spokesman J P Dhanopia said, "Our stand is clear right from day one on the issue that the probe should be conducted by sitting high court Judge."
"The same demand was also made in the petition filed in the high court on the issue," he added.
Meanwhile, Jail Minister Kusum Mehdele rejected allegations that there was lax security at the prison and that a large number of security personnel were posted with ministers.
A PIL was filed on Thursday in the Madhya Pradesh High Court by a journalist and social worker seeking a judicial probe into the alleged encounter in which the eight SIMI activists were killed in Bhopal on October 31.
The undertrial activists of the outlawed SIMI escaped from the central jail here on the intervening night of October 30-31 and were subsequently killed in an encounter on the outskirts of the city on October 31.
Before escaping from the jail, the SIMI activists had killed a head constable, Ramashankar Yadav.
A senior police official associated with the probe said the purported audio tape about the conversation related to encounter will also be part of overall investigation.
Another senior police official questioned the genuineness of the voices in the audio tape and said it was a matter of probe.
After the encounter took place, conflicting versions from police and state Home Minister have surfaced, leading to allegations that it might be fake.
A controversy also raged over the police action following the daring pre-dawn jail-break, after TV channels showed footage purportedly from the encounter site in which a policeman is seen pumping bullets into a man from close range after some unidentified person takes out what appears to be a knife in a plastic cover and places it back.