Professional advancement, rewards, and publicity were the motives behind the killings of Sohrabuddin Shaikh and his wife Kausar Bi by Gujarat cops led by Anti Terrorism Squad DIG D G Vanjhara and his team. This is revealed in the chargesheet that was filed by the CID (Crime) before an Ahmedabad metropolitan court on Monday.

More significantly, by keeping mum, the chargesheet puts to rest the earlier theories of Rajasthan marble lobby or some Ahmedabad builders behind the killings, harassed as they were by Shaikh and his gang. There is no evidence that the agency could find in support of these theories, says the chargesheet.

It is these theories that had fuelled speculation about the involvement of some politicians in the whole episode. This is also for the first time that the investigating agency has spoken in black and white about the intentions of the accused policemen in staging the encounter.

Indicating toward earlier encounters staged by Vanjhara and his team that included SP Rajkumar Pandian, the chargesheet says that the cops were hungry for reward, wanted publicity, and saw the encounters as easy way for professional advancement, informed sources in the CID. As precedents, the chargesheet mentions the press conferences that Vanjhara had organised after earlier encounters. As the then deputy commissioner of police in Ahmedabad, Vanjhara was rewarded by the present dispensation in 2002 for successfully averting an attack on the Rathyatra.

The chargesheet, however, does not reveal anything about the linkages between the encounters and professional advancement. For example, it does not say anything about what could have been the rewards, or who could have rewarded the cops. Top sources in the Gujarat Police who have been watching the developments closely, informed that the indication was clearly toward the political masters of Vanjhara and company. The chargesheet though clears the Rajasthan Police of any involvement in the murder of Kausar Bi.