Gandhinagar: On Wednesday, the 27th of March, the disgraced former IPS officer Sanjiv Bhatt was convicted in the 1996 Drug Planting case of Palanpur under NDPS (Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act). Bhatt’s conviction came after he was presented before the Palanpur sessions court during the day.
The NDPS case traces its origins back to 1996 during Sanjiv Bhatt’s tenure as the District Superintendent of Police in Banaskantha, when he fabricated evidence against a lawyer by placing 1.5 kg of opium in a hotel in Palanpur.
Sanjiv Bhatt was arrested by the Gujarat CID on the accusation of falsely implicating the lawyer Sumersingh Rajpurohit by planting opium in a hotel room in Palanpur.
Gujarat court convicts former IPS officer Sanjiv Bhatt in 1996 drug seizure case
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A probe by Rajasthan Police later revealed that Rajpurohit was innocent, and Banaskantha Police had deliberately framed him, and he was taken away forcibly from his residence in Pali, Rajasthan.
Sanjiv Bhatt is already serving life sentence in a case related to custodial death. In 2019, disgraced former IPS officer Sanjeev Bhatt was sentenced to life imprisonment in a custodial death case. The Jamnagar court pronounced its verdict sentencing Bhatt to life imprisonment in the 1989 custodial death case.
Bhatt was the prime accused in the 1989 custodial death case where he was posted as the ASP in Jamnagar. Bhatt had allegedly detained over a hundred people during a communal riot and one of them had died.
The case concerns with the death of one Prabhudas Vaishnani who had died to to the injuries inflicted upon him under police custody. Six other policemen along with Bhatt were also the accused in the case. (with Agency inputs)
