Dismissed IPS officer Sanjiv Bhatt sent for 10 days remand by Gujarat High Court’s order on Tuesday in connection with two decades old abduction case.
Bhatt’s 14 days remand plea moved by Gujarat CID crime department was rejected by a local court of Palanpur town of Banaskantha district on Monday. Subsequently, Gujarat police approached High Court with the same 14 days remand request to interrogate former cop, but the High Court gave 10 days remand.
The 1988 batch IPS officer was arrested on September 5 by a Special Investigation Team (SIT) formed by Gujarat CID crime from his residence in Ahmedabad on the charges of abduction and framing a Rajasthan based lawyer in crime related to narcotics.
In 1996 a Rajasthan base lawyer Sumer Singh Rajpurohit was allegedly abducted and framed in a narcotics (opium) case on the instruction of Bhatt (when he was Banaskantha SP) from a hotel in North Gujarat town Palanpur. Subsequently Rajpurohit filed a case against Bhatt and several others in Pali, Rajasthan.
Following Gujarat High Court had ordered to form a Special Investigation Team (SIT). During investigation SIT found that Bhatt had framed Rajpurohit by filing false case. The Rajasthan lawyer in his complaint claimed that he was abducted by police in civil dress in order to oblige then sitting judge of Gujarat High Court justice RR Jain.
Rajpurohit alleged that the false case was filed against him to force his family to evict a rented commercial property belonging to Justice Jain’s sister in Pali town of Rajasthan. He went on to say that he was not only abducted by implicated in a false Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) case after Gujarat police found nearly 1 kg opium from a hotel in Palanpur. According to him, he never booked a hotel room in Palanpur and when the police raided the hotel, he was in Pali.
Rajpurohit further alleged that after abducting him, Bhatt and his juniors pressurised him to vacate the rented property and threatened him to frame under NDPS Act. According to him, he had no other option but to vacate the property at that point of time.