SC refuses to interfere in probe against IPS officer Sanjeev in 22-year-old case
New Delhi: In a setback to arrested former IPS officer Sanjiv Bhatt, the Supreme Court on Thursday dismissed his wife's plea challenging
the police probe and his judicial custody in a 22-year-old case of alleged planting of drugs to arrest an advocate,
and said that he could approach an "appropriate forum" for relief.
A bench of Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi and Justices S K Kaul and K M Joseph held that it was not appropriate for the apex court to interfere in the ongoing investigation.
Senior advocate Mukul Rohatgi, appearing for the Gujarat government, said that Sanjiv Bhatt was arrested on September 5, in accordance with law and produced before the jurisdictional magistrate at Palanpur of Gujarat within 24 hours seeking his police custody.
He said that the assertions of the petitioner, Shweta Bhatt, that the accused was not allowed to sign the 'vakalatnama' are factually wrong, incorrect and contrary to the contemporaneous record and appear to have been made to create prejudice against the investigation.
Rohatgi said that Sanjiv Bhatt's counsel had appeared before the magistrate to oppose the plea for police remand filed by the probe agency and it was recorded in the order of September 6.
He said that everything was done in compliance with orders of the court.
On the Vakalatnama issue, Rohatgi said that during the days of judicial custody between September 6 to September 12, two lawyers Shirishbhai Modi and S B Thakore had met the accused-petitioner's husband.
The state government said that Thakore met Bhatt twice and Shirishbhai Modi met him once during his judicial custody.
The government in its affidavit said besides the lawyers even relatives of Bhatt have met him in jail and he was represented by a lawyer of his choice in the high court.
"The facts clearly show and indicate that the accused - petitioner's husband, at no point of time was prevented in any manner from either meeting his lawyers or signing Vakalatnama and/or any other documents or from meeting anyone," the affidavit said.
