Cops comb Bhatt’s house amid protests from family

A team of eight policemen from the Ghatlodia Police Station and the city crime branch descended on the house around 2.30 am. Bhatt’s wife Shweta and children were there at the house. Bhatt’s daughter,who studies in Mumbai,had come in on Saturday morning.

Shweta stopped the policemen at the door,demanding a fresh search warrant since they had already searched her home for over two hours till midnight on Friday.

The crime branch inspector insisted they had been asked to search the house because “they might find necessary material evidence”. Shweta called up Bhatt’s lawyer I H Syed who rushed to the house,to read out the law to them. “Please let us do our job. We will give you the search warrant tomorrow,” the police told her.

The Ghatlodia police inspector showed her a letter with no date that said a search had been ordered in Bhatt’s residence following a complaint by constable KD Pant.

But Shweta got suspicious and they argued,forcing the crime branch inspector to go to the Ghatlodia Police Station to get the search warrant.

They came back with a fresh warrant signed by ACP N C Patel,which said,“On the instructions of the Ahmedabad police commissioner,the investigating officer has been asked to conduct a search at Sanjiv Bhatt’s residence to search for the computer,laptop,scanners and all the related items that may have been used by Bhatt for his case-related work.” There was no mention of K D Pant.

The policemen then went around taking pictures and video-graphing the whole house beginning from the main gate to the third floor. They opened the refrigerator,shoe racks,Shweta’s and her daughter’s cupboards in the bedrooms,the kitchen loft,store room and even looked under the dining table.

Finally,from the third floor,they found an IBM computer whose CPU was seized. They borrowed some plain paper and glue from the Bhatts to seal the unit and assured the family it would go straight to the forensic laboratory.

Not satisfied,they videographed the house again,focussing this time on the bedrooms and cupboards of the house,including the terrace and the water tank.

A 5-10 minute break later,they went to the garden to shoot a video. Shweta got suspicious as one crime branch inspector walked about with his hands in his pockets to the corners of the garden. When she questioned him,he shouted, “We are not here to plant anything.” The two got into an argument.

They then asked for water and had ginger tea and began another round. Just as they were doing the inquest report,one of the inspectors got a call,presumably from the higher-ups asking them to value all the bronze and brass artefacts in the house. At this point Shweta broke down. She told the policemen that if Pant’s complaint was the premise of her husband’s arrest,they were overstepping their brief. But the policemen paid no heed. Shweta tried to call some senior police officers,but nobody took her call.

The police then called their detection team with a brassware expert. The man valued the brassware and artifacts at Rs 40,000. When Shweta’s father insisted,the police read the panchnama out aloud and told them they would get a copy on Sunday.

Shweta told The Indian Express,“Yesterday,a team of 20 policemen went to my 76-year old mother-in-law’s house to search. She did not even know that her son was arrested.”