Baba Siddique murder case: Why Lawrence Bishnoi can be questioned only at Sabarmati jail

The restrictive order imposed under section 268 of the Criminal Procedural Code (CrPC) was valid till August this year, and now has been extended under section 303 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023 (BNSS) that replaced the CrPC in July, which will be in force till August 2025, as per a new order of the MHA, confirmed DIG Shweta Shrimali, Superintendent of Sabarmati Central Jail.

The Indian Express reported earlier that the Union Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) had in August 2023 issued an order under Section 268 of the Criminal Procedural Code (CrPC) against Bishnoi, which prevented the prisoner from being taken out of the prison for any purpose.

Section 303 of the BNSS, just like the CrPC section, states, “303. (1) The state government or the central government, as the case may be, may, at any time, having regard to the matters specified in sub-section (2), by general or special order, direct that any person or class of persons shall not be removed from the prison in which he or they may be confined or detained, and thereupon, so long as the order remains in force, no order made under section 302, whether before or after the order of the state government, shall have effect in respect of such person or class of persons.”

According to DIG Shrimali, “If any police or agency wants to interrogate him, they must provide a judicial order and any investigation pertaining to his person must be carried out in the prison premises itself. We have not received any such requests recently.”

Notably, while senior officials of the Gujarat Police declined to either confirm or deny whether Bishnoi was being held in an isolation cell at the prison “due to this having a bearing on national security as well as law and order”, officials did confirm that he continued to exercise the rights of any other under trial prisoner at the jail facility in Ahmedabad.

The Indian Express had on October 14, quoting a Mumbai Police official, reported that a man named Shubham Lonkar, who had put up a social media post through his account ‘shubuu lonkar’, that Lawrence Bishnoi was responsible for the shooting on Baba Siddique, is a resident of Akola and is currently absconding, while his brother Pravin, who is also allegedly part of the conspiracy, has been arrested from Pune. When asked about the possibility of Bishnoi himself putting up such a social media post or having it put up with consultation from someone outside the prison, DIG Shrimali said, “It is not possible for Bishnoi to put up social media posts himself or consult anyone to do so on the outside.”

The Indian Express also earlier reported the Mumbai Police as stating that three shooters involved in Siddique’s murder are part of Lawrence Bishnoi’s gang.
The 31-year-old gangster has been allegedly involved in more than two dozen serious crimes, said officials.