Ahmedabad: The Gujarat government today opposed the bail plea of Patel quota agitation leader Hardik Patel, saying he sought to spread disorder out of a “grudge” against the state government.
Government pleader Mitesh Amin was making submissions before Justice A J Desai of Gujarat High Court.
The case of sedition filed against Hardik by Surat police was justified because he was trying to challenge the police by instigating his associate, Vipul Patel, to kill the policemen instead of committing suicide, the government lawyer said.
He also cited phone call records in which Hardik is heard “tutoring” Vipul by asking him to tell the police he (Hardik) never asked him to kill policemen, a day after he made the first statement in front of TV reporters.
Vipul had threatened to kill himself over the demand of OBC quota for the Patel community.
Amin said Hardik made the statement (about killing the cops) even when Vipul had, a day before, withdrew his threat of suicide, because Hardik wanted to “spread disturbance and create law and order problem because of a grudge against the government” after the police action at GMDC ground in Ahmedabad where he had held a mega rally in August 2015.
Hardik is also facing a sedition case in Ahmedabad.
He approached the high court for bail after the lower courts refused him bail.
—-PTI