A special CBI court on Tuesday sent senior IPS officer P P Pandey, an accused in 2004 Ishrat encounter killing case, in judicial custody till August 27, after he surrendered before the court here.
After the Supreme Court on Monday refused to grant him protection in the form of anticipatory bail, state Additional Director General of Police (crime) P P Pandey appeared before the special CBI court of Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate H S Khutwad on Tuesday and surrendered himself.
CBI, which is probing the alleged fake encounter case, filed an application seeking 14 days' custody of Pandey for interrogation. The court has fixed the hearing on it on Wednesday.
Pandey, who had been evading arrest since long, was sent to Sabarmati central jail here.
He was the Joint Commissioner of Police (Crime), Ahmedabad, when Ishrat, a Mumbra-based student, Javed Shaikh alias Pranesh Pillai, Amjad Ali Rana and Zeeshan Johar were gunned down by Crime Branch sleuths on June 15, 2004, near here.
After his name surfaced in the encounter, Pandey had gone underground from April this year. He was declared an absconder by the court.
In the meantime, Pandey approached courts first for quashing of FIR against him and then for anticipatory bail to evade arrest in the case, but both of his appeals were rejected by all the courts, including the Supreme Court.
The CBI court here had issued a non-bailable warrant against Pandey on August 7.
Seven Gujarat policemen, including Pandey, had been named as accused and charged with murder and criminal conspiracy, among others, by CBI. In its charge sheet filed earlier, the probe agency had said that the encounter was "fake" and a joint operation between Gujarat police and Intelligence Bureau.
Upon his surrender, Pandey filed an application before the court seeking its direction not to take cognisance of the charge sheet filed against him by CBI on July 3, 2013, on the grounds that the probing agency had not taken prior sanctions, as mandated for a public servant under section 197 of CrPC, from government before naming him in the charge sheet.
The court reserved the order on Pandey's application after hearing both the sides.
Pandey's lawyer Ajay Choksi argued that, "as a serving Additional DGP of the state he is a public servant and is protected under section 197 of Criminal Procedure Code (CrPC) and also under section 161 of the Bombay Police Act."
He further said that nowhere in the charge sheet it was mentioned that CBI had taken prior sanctions or was in the process of seeking sanctions.
Opposing Pandey's application, CBI posed a question that, "Section 197 of CrPC gives protection for performing official duty but how the brutal murder of four people in a planned manner falls under official duty of a public servant?" CBI lawyer L D Tiwari also opposed the application on the grounds of maintainability.