The Special CBI Court will give its verdict on jailed Gujarat cop and one of the accused in the Ishrat Jahan fake encounter case NK Amin’s default bail application on July 9. HS Khutwad, Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate heard arguments from Amin’s advocate as well as the CBI during the hearing of the plea on Saturday. He sought default bail on the ground that CBI had filed “incomplete” chargesheet on last Wednesday.
In his application, Amin claimed that the CBI failed to file a chargesheet against him within the stipulated 90 days of his arrest. He was arrested on April 4 and the chargesheet was filed on July 3. “The CBI’s chargesheet is defective and incomplete as it does not conform to rules prescribed under Section 173(5) of CrPC. Non-compliance of rules on the part of the CBI allows Amin right to seek benefit of default bail under Section 167(2),” said Ruturaj Nanavati, Amin’s advocate.
The suspended DSP also cited provisions of Section 167(2) of CrPC & said an accused is entitled to seek bail if the investigating agency does not provide all the relevant documents on the basis of which he has been named in the chargesheet within a stipulated time.
The chargesheet states that Amin and Tarun Barot another accused in the fake encounter case, abducted 19-year-old Ishrat Jahan and her accomplice Javed Shaikh alias Pranesh Pillai two days prior to their killing on June 15, 2004 near Ahmedabad. He is also accused of firing shots at Ishrat, Javed and two alleged Pakistani nationals Zeeshan Johar and Amjad Ali Rana. All four were killed by Ahmedabad Crime Branch in what CBI claimed was a staged shootout.
Earlier, five policemen —accused in the case — Gl Singhal, Barot, JG Parmar, Bharat Patel and Anaju Chaudhary — were granted default bail as the CBI failed to file chargesheet within 90 days of their respective arrest. The CBI arrested Amin on April 4 after his release on bail in the Sohrabuddin Sheikh encounter case.