Ahmedabad, Aug. 14: Gujarat High Court will hear a case of alleged fake encounter killing of a petty gambler six years ago, days after it ordered a fresh probe into the death of college girl Ishrat Jahan.

The court, which will hear the case on Sadiq Jamal’s murder on Monday, is expected to decide whether to hand over the probe to the CBI.

Unlike other fake encounter cases, Jamal’s case has a witness who has filed an affidavit that has drilled holes in the police claim that Jamal was a “terrorist” on a mission to kill Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi and VHP leader Pravin Togadia.

Jamal, 26, was killed in an alleged encounter in the sensitive Naroda area of Ahmedabad around midnight of January 13, 2003. The police version — the person shot down was a Laskhar-e-Toiba terrorist out to kill Gujarat leaders — found resonance in the cases of Ishrat and Sohrabuddin Sheikh.

Ishrat, 19, was shot dead on the outskirts of Ahmedabad on June 15, 2004. According to the police, Ishrat was a Lashkar fidayeen out to kill Modi.

Sohrabuddin, another small-time criminal, was also dubbed a terrorist after the police shot him dead in 2005.

Jamal was “spotted” on the night of January 13, 2003, walking towards the Naroda timber mart when a police car stopped across the road. Jamal reportedly opened fire and was shot down in retaliatory fire. No police officer was injured, though.

The crime branch claimed that Jamal was a “highly trained militant and a contract killer”.

Last year, Jamal’s brother Shabir submitted an affidavit in the high court, raising questions about the “encounter”.

Jamal, from Bhavnagar in Gujarat, had moved to Mumbai in 1996 from where he went to Dubai. He returned to Bhavnagar in November 2002 and was arrested in a gambling case on November 9.

Within a week, he also got bail.

Since Jamal had cases pending against him, he went to Mumbai to meet a journalist friend, Ketan Kirodkar, to seek help. Kirodkar took him to his friend, Mumbai police encounter specialist Daya Nayak.

Nayak handed over him to Gujarat IPS officer D.G. Vanzara and two other officers of the Ahmedabad crime branch, Kirodkar claimed in his affidavit submitted to a Mumbai court.

Kirodkar claimed he had seen Vanzara, who then headed the crime branch, taking Jamal into custody from Nayak around two weeks before the “encounter”.

Vanzara, now in jail, has been nailed for his alleged role in the Sohrabuddin and Ishrat cases.