The Supreme Court on Thursday (December 11) refused to suspend the 20-year jail sentence imposed on ex-IPS officer Sanjiv Bhatt in the 1996 drug planting case.

The case was listed today before a bench of Justices JK Maheshwari and Vijay Bishnoi .

Senior Advocate Kapil Sibal (for Bhatt) at the outset submitted that he has undergone 7 years and 3 months of sentence. The bench said that Bhatt can seek an early hearing of the matter.

"Why? I have already undergone more than half the sentence," S ibal submitted. Justice Maheshwari then pointed out that the quantity of drugs involved was quite high - 5KG. Refuting this, Sibal said that this prosecution allegation has not been proved, and the conviction was for the possession of 1.015 KG of opium. Since it was not commercial quantity, Se

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