Ahmedabad:
Sanjeev Bhatt, the controversial whistleblower officer in the Gujarat police has told NDTV that his suspension by the state government is untenable in law. The 1988- batch Indian Police Service (IPS) officer, on Monday, was served a five-page suspension letter by the state Home Department, charging him of unauthorised absence.
The suspension order came just three days after Mr Bhatt told the Supreme Court that the state government, which is meant to prosecute those accused for the communal riots in 2002, has actually been leaking information for use in their defence. In an affidavit filed in the apex court on Friday, Mr Bhatt included emails that allegedly show how the state government was sharing information with the defence counsel.
Mr Bhatt is already facing departmental proceedings which were initiated against him a few months ago. Director General of Police (DGP) Chitaranjan Singh had shot off a letter to him in March alleging that he was not attending to his duties at the State Reserve Police (SRP) chowki in Junagarh, where he is posted. Mr Bhatt had replied to the notices claiming that he was on leave for his mother's surgery and had reported to duty after his leave.
The DGP's office had also issued him a notice for keeping the state security personnel from the SRP chowki for his personal use without any authorisation, a charge Mr Bhatt denied. Mr Singh said the suspension had nothing to do with the affidavit filed in the apex court. "These are purely administrative matters, and we have given him enough time to explain."
However, Mr Bhatt says the timing of his suspension indicated that it was indeed linked to the revelation of emails. "The grounds for my suspension mentioned in the order are not only frivolous but also untenable in law."
Mr Bhatt told NDTV that he came across "very strong indications that the entire justice delivery mechanism in Gujarat was being manipulated by very senior constitutional authorities, senior office bearers in the Chief Minister's office and other people who were not a part of the government to subvert justice (during the 2002 riots probe).
On Supreme Court's directions, a Special Investigation Team (SIT) was appointed in 2008 to investigate the riots.
In his affidavit, Mr Bhatt had claimed that he has emails that show classified parts of the SIT were being emailed to Tushar Mehta, who is the Additional Advocate General of Gujarat. According to the policeman, Mr Mehta, who is meant to be handling the prosecution in different cases related to the riots, then forwarded emails containing the SIT excerpts to Gurumurthy Swaminathan, who is an RSS ideologue. Mr Gurumurthy then forwarded the information to lawyer Ram Jethmalani and his son, Mahesh, who represents former state Home Minister Amit Shah.
Along with other ministers and Mr Modi, Mr Shah is being investigated for whether they misused government machinery during the riots. Mr Mehta also shared the information, according to Mr Bhatt's affidavit, with lawyers for others accused in the riots.
Mr Bhatt claims that he shared this information with the SIT set up by the Supreme Court to investigate the riots. The SIT, he says, showed little interest on following up on his allegations.
The BJP says that Mr Bhatt's actions are politically motivated. Senior BJP leader Arun Jaitley told NDTV, "...if you investigate the matter, you'll find whether there is a collusion between the Gujarat government and the accused or between the police officer concerned, the Congress party functionaries and some civil society activists on how to frame a case"