Former IPS officer Sanjiv Bhatt was cleared by a court in Porbandar, Gujarat, in a 1997 custodial torture case, citing that the prosecution could not “prove the case beyond reasonable doubt”.
Sanjiv Bhatt, the then Superintendent of Police in Porbandar, was cleared on Saturday by additional chief judicial magistrate Mukesh Pandya in a case registered against him under IPC sections pertaining to causing grievous hurt to obtain confession and other provisions by giving him the benefit of the doubt due to lack of evidence.
Prior convictions for Bhatt included 20 years in prison in a 1996 case involving the planting of narcotics to frame a lawyer from Rajasthan in Palanpur and life in prison in a 1990 custodial death case in Jamnagar. He is incarcerated at the Rajkot Central Jail at the moment.
According to the court, the prosecution was unable to “prove the case beyond reasonable doubt” that the complainant was coerced into confessing to the crime and turning himself in by threatening him and employing lethal weapons to cause him agony.
Additionally, the case did not have the sanction needed to charge the accused, who at the time was a public worker carrying out his duties.
Following a complaint by a man named Naran Jadav, Bhatt and constable Vajubhai Chau, against whom the case was acquitted after his death, were charged under sections 330 (causing hurt to extort confession) and 324 (causing hurt with dangerous weapons) of the Indian Penal Code for torturing him physically and psychologically while he was in police custody in order to coerce a confession in a case under the Arms Act and the Terrorist and Disruptive Activities (Prevention) Act (TADA).
Based on Jadav’s allegation before a magistrate court on July 6, 1997, the court ordered a first information report against Bhatt and Chau to be filed in a Porbandar city B-division police station on April 15, 2013.
The prosecution claims that on July 5, 1997, a group of Porbandar police officers used a transfer permit to bring Jadav from the Sabarmati Central Jail in Ahmedabad to Bhatt’s home in Porbandar.
Jadav received electric shocks to several body parts, including his intimate areas. Electric shocks were also administered to his son.
After the plaintiff later told the judicial magistrate’s court about the torture, an investigation was mandated. On December 31, 1998, the court registered a case based on the evidence and summoned Bhatt and Chau.
The court issued a formal complaint against Bhatt and Chau on April 15, 2013.
Bhatt is being held for life in a 1990 custodial death case in Jamnagar.
In March 2024, a court in Palanpur, Banaskantha district, sentenced the former IPS officer to 20 years in prison for a 1996 case involving drug planting to frame a lawyer from Rajasthan.
In addition, he, activist Teesta Setalvad, and former Gujarat director general of police R B Sreekumar are all accused of fabricating evidence in connection with the 2002 Gujarat riots.
After the Gujarat government dismissed him from the police force for unapproved leave, Bhatt appealed the Gujarat High Court’s January 9, 2024, decision to deny his appeal to the Supreme Court.
On June 20, 2019, the high court confirmed the sessions court in Jamnagar’s conviction of Bhatt and co-accused Pravinsinh Zala for murder under sections 302 (murder), 323 (voluntarily causing harm), and 506 (criminal intimidation) of the IPC.
On October 30, 1990, after a communal disturbance in Jamjodhpur town and a “bandh” demand against the halting of BJP leader L K Advani’s “rath yatra” for the construction of a Ram temple in Ayodhya, Bhatt, who was then the additional SP, had arrested about 150 persons.
After being released from custody, Prabhudas Vaishnani, one of the detainees, passed away in the hospital.
In an affidavit he filed in the Supreme Court accusing then-chief minister Narendra Modi of involvement in the Gujarat riots of 2002, Bhatt made headlines. Allegations were refuted by a special investigating team.
In 2011, he was placed on leave, and in August 2015, the Ministry of Home Affairs fired him for “unauthorized absence.”
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