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Zahira not in our custody: Gujarat cops

- By Our Correspondents in Ahmedabad, Baroda

Nov. 5: Key witness in the Best Bakery case Zahira Sheikh, who arrived in Ahmedabad late on Thursday night, remained cooped up in her room the whole day on Friday at Silver Oak Resort on the Ahmedabad-Gandhinagar highway. IB sources confirmed that she was still based at the resort though there was speculation that she had left for Mumbai by road on Friday afternoon.

Ms Sheikh arrived with two family members on Thursday but the purpose of her visit to Ahmedabad could not be ascertained. The gates of the resort were locked up even as journalists kept a vigil outside the compound. Director-general of police A.K. Bhargav said the police was providing protection to Ms Sheikh as per the directive of the Supreme Court and that she was not in its custody. He also said he did not know the purpose of her visit to Ahmedabad.

Meanwhile, the Muslim population of Ekta Nagar in Baroda, where Ms Sheikh and her family resided after the riots in 2002, burnt an effigy of Ms Sheikh to protest her volte-face in the Best Bakery case on Friday. A group of protestors flayed Ms Sheikh for "shaking hands with communal forces." They even labelled her as a "blot on the community."

Ekta Nagar is a colony of riot-affected Muslims built by city-based Muslim leaders and Islamic Relief Committee members after the Gujarat riots in 2002. Houses were provided to the riot victims on subsidised rates in October 2002.

The Sheikh family was also allotted a house here. They had stayed at Ekta Nagar for about eight months. However, the family’s relations with others in the colony were not cordial, the locals said.

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