HC reserves order on Bhatt’s quashing plea

Gujarat EDN

AM 15DEC2011

HC reserves order on Bhatt’s quashing plea

The IPS officers has filed the petition in the alleged police atrocity case of 1990

Gujarat High Court on Wednesday reserved the order in a quashing petition filed by suspended IPS officer Sanjiv Bhatt in connection with alleged police atrocity case leading to the death of a person in 1990.

As many as 133 people, including Prabhu Das Vaishnavi, were arrested in the wake of communal flareup at Jamjodhpur on October 10, 1990. They were kept in police custody for a month before Vaishnavi was admitted to a hospital upon his release on November 8, 1990. He died after 10 days in the hospital.

The matter was investigated by the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) which submitted a closure report saying there was nothing against Bhatt and other police officers. The post-mortem report also did not say anything against the police officers.

However, a local magistrate court did not accept the closure report and took cognizance of the case.

Against this order of the magistrate court, Gujarat government moved a revision petition which remained pending till July 6, 2011, when the state government withdrew it, thereby exposing Bhatt to face prosecution.

Bhatt has alleged that he was being targeted because he had accused Chief Minister Narendra Modi of complicity in the 2002 communal riots in the state.