Ahmedabad: A non-bailable warrant was issued against Ishrat Jahan encounter case accused Gujarat IPS officer PP Pandey on Wednesday. The CBI court also rejected Pandey's anticipatory bail plea. He had sought the bail saying a higher court is yet to decide on his plea to quash the FIR against him in the case.
Pandey's plea seeking exemption from daily appearance in the court was also rejected by the court.
Even on Tuesday, a Special Court had rejected the anticipatory bail application of Pandey who then moved the Gujarat High Court, which refused to give him protection from arrest by the CBI till hearing of his plea on Wednesday.
The court had declined to offer further protection to the Additional Director General of Police (ADGP)-rank officer from arrest by CBI, which is probing the case and has dubbed the encounter as "fake".
Pandey's advocate Mitesh Amin had requested the High Court to offer protection to his client from arrest by the CBI till Wednesday but the court rejected the plea.
The 1982-batch IPS officer was Joint Commissioner of Police (Crime), Ahmedabad, when Ishrat, a Mumbai-based student, her friend Javed Shaikh alias Pranesh Pillai, and their associates Amjad Ali Rana and Zeeshan Johar were gunned down by Crime Branch sleuths on June 15, 2004 near Ahmedabad.
Police had then claimed the four were terrorists on a mission to kill Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi. However, according to the CBI's chargesheet filed in July, the encounter, a joint operation by Gujarat Police and Intelligence Bureau, was stage-managed.
Seven Gujarat policemen, including Pandey, have been named as accused and charged with murder and criminal conspiracy, among others.
(With additional information from PTI)
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