Former IPS officer Sanjeev Bhatt
Former IPS officer Sanjeev Bhatt has been acquitted in a 27-year-old custodial torture case (1997). A court in Porbandar, Gujarat has given this decision. The court said that the prosecution could not ‘prove the charge’. Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate Mukesh Pandya on Saturday acquitted the then Porbandar Superintendent of Police (SP) Bhatt due to lack of evidence in the case registered against him under sections of the Indian Penal Code.
Case of implicating a lawyer from Rajasthan
Earlier, Sanjeev Bhatt was sentenced to life imprisonment in a custodial death case in Jamnagar in 1990 and to 20 years in prison in a 1996 Palanpur case related to drug possession to implicate a Rajasthan lawyer. He is currently lodged in Rajkot Central Jail.
forced to confess
The court said the prosecution could not ‘prove the allegations’ that the complainant was forced to confess to the crime and was forced to surrender by using dangerous weapons and issuing threats. Along with this, the court also took note of the fact that necessary sanction was not taken in the case to prosecute the accused, who was a public servant at that time.
hurt with dangerous weapons
Sanjeev Bhatt and constable Vajubhai Chau were booked under sections 330 (causing hurt to elicit confession) and 324 (causing hurt by dangerous weapons) of the Indian Penal Code. After the death of Constable Vajubhai, the case against him was dropped.
were subjected to physical and mental torture
The case against the duo was registered on the complaint of a person named Naran Jadav, who alleged that they were subjected to physical and mental torture in police custody to extract confessions under the Terrorist and Disruptive Activities (Prevention) Act (TADA) and Arms Act. Mental torture was given.
with language input
