Gujarat minister Amit Shah’s anticipatory bail plea rejected

AHMEDABAD - Gujarat Minister of State for Home Amit Shah’s anticipatory bail plea was Friday rejected by a special CBI court here.

Shah on Friday approached the court for anticipatory bail after failing to answer the Central Bureau of Investigation summons for the second consecutive day, even as the agency filed a chargesheet against former deputy commissioner of police Abhay Chudasama in the 2005 Sohrabuddin Sheikh fake encounter case.

The statements from Shah and his lawyer Mahesh Jethmalani on Thursday notwithstanding, the minister did not turn up at the CBI office. He had been summoned to appear at 1 p.m. on Thursday and at the same time Friday.

Instead, lawyer Mitesh Amin, with an authorization from Shah, came to the CBI office seeking a list of questions that the investigating agency planned to ask the minister. The CBI is reported to have turned down the plea.

Even as the minister’s lawyers later knocked at the doors of the CBI court seeking anticipatory bail, the agency moved to file the chargesheet against Chudasama.

The charge-sheet names 18 people, including 15 who are already in prison and three who are at large. The name Amit Shah reportedly figures among these three.

In a statement on Thursday, Shah had cited the short time given to him as the reason for his inability to answer the summons.

He had stated that he would make himself available for questioning by the CBI on Friday before the 1 p.m. deadline. However, the minister seems to have changed his mind and instead sent an emissary wanting a list of questions that the CBI proposed to ask before deciding on his appearance.

The Gujarat Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS) has been accused of killing Sohrabuddin near Ahmedabad. His wife Kauser-Bi has also been missing since then.

Police claimed the dead man was a Lashkar-e-Taiba operative.