Ahmedabad, Nov 12 (PTI) The Gujarat High Court has issued notices to the state government and Banaskantha superintendent of police after admitting a petition filed by a trustee of Lilavati Hospital seeking transfer of investigation in the Rs 45 crore Lilavati Trust theft case to the Central Bureau of Investigation.

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Prashant Mehta, the de facto trustee of the Lilavati Kirtilal Mehta Medical Trust, which runs hospitals in Mumbai in Maharashtra and in Palanpur city in Banaskantha district, had filed a special criminal application in the Gujarat High Court seeking transfer of investigation in the case to the CBI.

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The petition accused Banaskantha SP, inspectors of Local Crime Branch and Palanpur (East) police station of being hand in glove with the unlawful trustees of Lilavati Trust and other persons shown as accused in the theft case lodged recently.

In his petition, Mehta raised questions on the Banaskantha police's inclination and ability to conduct a fair and impartial investigation in the case.

Hearing the petition on Thursday, Justice Hemant Prachchhak admitted Mehta's plea and issued notices to the state government and Banaskantha SP, and fixed November 25 as the date for the next hearing.

Earlier in October, Mehta had approached the HC and then a magistrate's court claiming Palanpur police was not registering an FIR in the theft case.

Following a directive by the Palanpur magistrate on October 27, an FIR was registered against 13 people in connection with the alleged theft of valuables, including diamond and jewellery, worth Rs 45 crore from a safe vault at the trust-run Lilavati hospital in Palanpur city.

As per Mehta's complaint, the accused persons, including his uncles, conspired with each other to carry out the theft of valuables kept in the safe vault.

The complainant is the son of Kishor Mehta, a permanent trustee, and the grandson of Kirtilal Mehta, who founded the trust.

The FIR was registered in Palanpur East police station under sections 380 (theft in dwelling house), 406 (criminal breach of trust), and 120 B (criminal conspiracy) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC), a police official said.

The complainant stated the keys of the vault, placed inside Mani Bhavan building that houses the Lilavati Kirtilal Mehta Charitable Hospital in Palanpur, was in the possession of his father Kishor Mehta.

He stated in the FIR that the accused persons, who are no longer trustees, conspired with each other to renovate the building, broke the safety vault and decamped with valuables, including 3.5 kg gold jewellery, an 8.5 carat diamond of the Maharaja of Baroda, silver plates, a throne, a ring etc, all valued at Rs 40-45 crore.

In the petition, Mehta claimed the police had opined that the matter was a civil dispute, and it was after this that he had filed an application seeking transfer of the case to CBI as the local police was "either not interested in investigating the case, or that the police is hand in glove with the accused persons".

(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)