Court reserves order on ex-cop Bhatt’s bail plea

A sessions court in Ahmedabad today reserved its order on the bail application submitted by suspended police officer Sanjeev Bhatt till 17 October. Sessions Judge V K Vyas will hear the matter further on Thursday, when the government is likely to respond to the plea made by Bhatt's lawyer I H Syed.

Bhatt was arrested on 30 September for allegedly forcing a junior officer to file a false affidavit against Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi.

Special public prosecutor S V Raju stated that chief minister Modi had nothing to do with the first information report (FIR) filed against Bhatt. Allegations against Modi by Bhatt were simply to divert the attention from the main offence he had committed, he said. He claimed that involving Modi and the late police officer Haren Pandya in affidavits was to attract media attention.

Raju argued that Bhatt was not arrested immediately after the FIR was filed in June - he was given ample time, and four summonses were issued, despite which he did not appear before the investigating officer.

The prosecutor also alleged that Bhatt had suppressed the fact that he had approached the Supreme Court for bail on the very next day of his arrest on 1 October. The bail plea was withdrawn from the SC registry later on the same day, but Bhatt's lawyer Syed placed the fact on record only after filing a bail application in the local court on 3 October.

Syed argued that Bhatt was arrested by misusing the government machinery. He said it was the government that was tampering with evidence to dilute Bhatt's defence. He said this was just an attempt to humiliate and discredit Bhatt, who was a witness in Zakia Jaffery's petition in the Supreme Court where Modi was an accused along with 62 others.