The Supreme Court on Wednesday issued notices to Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi and the state Government on a petition seeking a CBI inquiry into an alleged fake encounter in which a youth, Pranesh Kumar Pillai alias Javed Shaikh, was killed in 2004.

The petition was filed by Shaikh's father M R Gopinath Pillai, alleging that his son was gunned down by the Gujarat Police for having links with terrorist groups though four years after the incident there was still no evidence to this effect.

On June 15, 2004, a police team had gunned down Shaikh and three others, including a woman, in what was termed an encounter death. The encounter was among those supervised by suspended DIG D G Vanzara. The cops had claimed that the four, who were members of the Lashkar-e-Taiba, had entered Gujarat to kill Narendra Modi.

On Wednesday, a Bench comprising Justice Tarun Chatterjee and Justice Aftab Alam also issued notice to the state Government on another petition filed by lyricist Javed Akhtar, seeking a probe by a special investigation team into the alleged fake encounters in Gujarat.

In his petition, Akhtar has claimed that innocent people, particularly from Muslim community, were being targeted as terrorists and killed.

Citing new report, the petition said the killing of one Sameer Khan in October 2002 was a fake encounter and there was an attempt by the Gujarat Government to hush up the incident.

Khan, who was in police custody, was killed on the intervening night of October 21-22, 2002 when he allegedly snatched the revolver of a policeman who had accompanied him with a team to a spot where he had murdered a constable.

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