Ahmedabad:
The Gujarat High Court today rejected the anticipatory bail plea of senior Gujarat IPS officer PP Pande in the Ishrat Jahan fake encounter case. On the other hand, a Central Bureau of Investigation or CBI court has issued non-bailable warrant against the police officer as he failed to appear before the magistrate.
Mr Pande had gone missing after being made an accused in the encounter case two months ago. He surfaced last month, making a couple of dramatic appearances in the court, first on a stretcher and then in a wheelchair.
The 1982-batch IPS officer was Joint Commissioner of Police (Crime), Ahmedabad, when Mumbai-based Ishrat, her friend Javed Shaikh, alias Pranesh Pillai, and other two persons namely Amjad Ali Rana and Zeeshan Johar were killed by Crime Branch officials on June 15, 2004 on the outskirts of Ahmedabad.
In its first chargesheet filed last month, the CBI listed Mr Pande as one of seven policemen who allegedly were involved in the conspiracy to kill her in what it described as a "staged encounter" committed "in cold blood".
The Gujarat Crime Branch had then claimed the four were terrorists, on a mission to kill Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi.