SC dismisses sacked IPS officer Sanjiv Bhatt’s plea for court-monitored probe

New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Tuesday dismissed the plea by former Indian Police Service (IPS) officer Sanjiv Bhatt seeking a “fair, credible and independent” probe into the two first information reports (FIRs) lodged against him by the state government. The court also rejected his plea to make Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) president Amit Shah and several others respondents to the case.

The court had earlier reserved its verdict on 23 September.

A bench comprising chief justice H.L. Dattu and justice Arun Mishra on Tuesday said the probe against Bhatt would continue as per law. The Gujarat government dismissed Bhatt from service on 19 August.

The cases relate to disputed claims about then chief minister Narendra Modi’s alleged role in the 2002 Gujarat riots. Bhatt, represented by top human rights lawyers Indira Jaising and Prashant Bhushan, told the apex court that he was present at a meeting on 27 February 2002 at Modi’s home.

He alleged that two FIRs were registered to intimidate him. The FIRs were filed by Bhatt’s junior K.D. Panth in June 2011 and additional solicitor general Tushar Mehta in August 2011.

Bhatt alleged that the proceedings against him were “intended to prevent him from disclosing the sensitive information revealing the criminal nexus between the state ministers, politicians, bureaucrats, senior police officers, government law officers, and non-state actors, who grossly interfered with the administration of justice…”

Bhatt leaked a series of emails between Mehta, who was then additional advocate general of Gujarat, and some of the accused in the riots, alleging that Mehta shared confidential information and legal documents with the accused against whom the state was conducting cases.