MUMBAI: The Bangladeshi national accused of breaking into actor Saif Ali Khan’s home and stabbing him has sought immediate release from jail, claiming that the police did not give him in writing the grounds for his arrest before apprehending him, which is mandatory.
In a plea filed before the metropolitan magistrate court in Bandra on Friday, Mohammad Shariful Islam Shehzad, 30, stated that his arrest was in violation of section 47 of Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita (BNSS), which mandates that a police officer arresting any person without a warrant should communicate full particulars of the offence for which they are being arrested or other grounds for such an arrest.
The plea, filed through advocate Ajay Gawli, relied on various Supreme Court and high court orders holding that the law mandates furnishing the reasons and grounds of arrest to the accused before apprehending them, and that not complying with this mandatory requirement renders the arrest illegal.
In one of the judgements mentioned in the plea, the Supreme Court held that police officers must furnish the grounds of arrest to the accused persons in writing. This should be done to avoid situations arising out of conflicting claims and to enable the accused to get a proper opportunity to defend themselves during the remand hearing, the top court said. It also held that subsequent remand orders and the filing of the charge sheet in the case would not cure the defect.
“It was mandatory upon the authorities to furnish the grounds of arrest to the applicant/accused person prior to his production before the…court while seeking remand,” said the plea. “The applicant has been detained in custody despite no prima facie evidence justifying the necessity for his continued detention,” added the plea.
Advocate Gawli said that Shariful is willing to cooperate with the investigation and to abide by the conditions imposed by the court. The court has asked the police to respond to Shariful’s plea, and the matter was adjourned to May 13.
Shariful was arrested on January 19 in a labour camp in Thane, three days after the alleged attack. According to the police, he allegedly broke into Khan’s 12th-floor residence in a Bandra West building in the early hours of January 16, with the intent to commit theft. In the ensuing confrontation, he allegedly stabbed Khan multiple times before fleeing.
Khan sustained six stab wounds, including a critical injury near his spinal cord where a knife fragment was lodged. The actor was discharged five days later.
In March, Shariful filed a bail plea in a sessions court, arguing that he was falsely implicated and the FIR against him was baseless. However, the court rejected the bail plea, saying there was strong forensic evidence against him, including CCTV footage and facial recognition analysis.
In April, the Bandra police filed a charge sheet in the case, which includes DNA analysis and fingerprints allegedly linking Shariful to the crime scene. The police also said they did a forensic analysis of CCTV footage from multiple locations in Mumbai that confirmed Shariful’s identity through facial recognition technology.