Gujarat police take Teesta Setalvad in custody, arrest former DGP for ‘fabricating evidence’

Ahmedabad, June 25

A day after the Supreme Court upheld the clean chit given by an SIT to Prime Minister Narendra Modi in the 2002 riots cases, the Gujarat police on Saturday arrested former Director General of Police RB Sreekumar and took in custody social activist Teesta Setalvad for allegedly conspiring to falsely implicate innocent persons.

The FIR, based on a complaint filed by an Ahmedabad crime branch official, also named former IPS officer Sanjiv Bhatt, who is already in jail in another case. Setalvad, who was picked up from her Mumbai residence, claimed her arrest was illegal and apprehended threat to her life.

“She will be arrested once she is brought to Ahmedabad,” police sources said.

Bhatt is sentenced to life imprisonment in a custodial death case, and in another case he is accused of planting contraband to frame a lawyer in a false case.

Setalvad was detained from her house in the Juhu area of Mumbai and later taken to the Santacruz police station for informing the local police about her detention, sources said.

“She has been taken by the Gujarat Anti-Terrorist Squad....we were not informed in advance about the case. They barged into the house and assaulted her before taking her with them,” alleged her lawyer Vijay Hiremath. But a local police official denied that Setalvad was assaulted.

Setalvad, Bhatt and Sreekumar “conspired to abuse the process of law by fabricating false evidence to make several persons to be convicted in an offence that is punishable with capital punishment,” said the complaint filed by Inspector DB Barad of the Ahmedabad crime branch.

They instituted “false and malicious criminal proceedings against innocent people with intention to cause injury to several persons, and prepared false records and dishonestly used those records as genuine with the intention to cause damage and injury to many persons,” as per the complaint. — PTI

FIR also names ex-IPS officer Bhatt

• The FIR, based on a complaint filed by an Ahmedabad crime branch official, also named former IPS officer Sanjiv Bhatt, who is already in jail in another case
• Setalvad, who was picked up from her Mumbai residence, claimed her arrest was illegal and apprehended threat to her life

Post verdict, ATS detains Teesta

• A day after the SC upheld the SIT clean chit to Narendra Modi in the 2002 riots cases, Gujarat ATS detained activist Teesta Setalvad from Mumbai.
• She has been booked for allegedly conspiring to falsely implicate innocent persons.
• Setalvad lodged a complaint in Mumbai, terming her detention illegal.

Join Whatsapp Channel of The Tribune for latest updates.