Sohrabuddin Sheikh encounter case: Bombay High Court rejects plea challenging Amit Shah's discharge

Mumbai: In a significant development, the Bombay High Court has rejected an interim application seeking to challenge the discharge of Union Home Minister and senior BJP leader Amit Shah in the sensational twin encounter cases involving alleged gangster Sohrabuddin Sheikh, his wife Kausar Bi and his associate Tulsiram Prajapati.

While dismissing the appeals filed by Sohrabuddin Sheikh’s brothers, Rubabuddin Sheikh and Nayabuddin Sheikh, against the December 21, 2018 verdict of the Special CBI Court acquitting 22 accused, the Bombay High Court also disposed of an application filed by Mumbai-based businessman Maniar Kalpesh Kumar challenging Shah’s discharge from the case.

In the 2005-06 twin encounter cases, Shah, then Gujarat Minister of State for Home, was arrested by the CBI in July 2010 and granted bail in October that year.

Mumbai's Special CBI Court discharged Shah, the then BJP national President, from the case on December 30, 2014.

“Interim Application No.1172 of 2026 is disposed of,” said the division bench of Chief Justice Shree Chandrashekhar and Justice Gautam Ankhad while rejecting Maniar’s plea filed this year.

“While the judgment in the acquittal appeals was under circulation, an application for impleadment vide Interim Application No.1172 of 2026 was filed by Maniar Kalpesh Kumar. Through this interim application, the applicant seeks to challenge the discharge of A-16, Amit Anilchandra Shah, by an order dated December 30, 2014 passed in the discharge application filed by A-16,” the court observed.

The High Court noted that the interim application was opposed by the CBI, which filed written submissions through the Additional Solicitor General of India.

The judges recorded that the CBI had placed on record copies of the December 30, 2014 order passed by the Special CBI Judge, the November 23, 2015 order in Criminal Revision Application (Stamp) No.413 of 2015 filed by Rubabuddin Sheikh, and the March 11, 2016 order in Criminal Application No.1248 of 2015 filed by activist Harsh Mander of New Delhi.

“These materials are suppressed by Maniar Kalpesh Kumar, aged about 53 years, engaged in business and residing at Goregaon-East, Mumbai. The applicant does not state how he gathered information that judgment in these cases had been reserved. The applicant is not a witness in Crime No.5 of 2005, which was re-registered by the CBI.

“He does not indicate how he is concerned with the pending criminal acquittal appeals and why he has surfaced about two decades after Crime No.5 of 2005 was registered. We, therefore, have no hesitation in observing that Interim Application No.1172 of 2026 has been filed with an oblique motive and at the instance of some political adversary of A-16,” the court observed.