The woman had at the time of her arrest, urged the court for bail on medical grounds, which was rejected.

Ramila Solanki (32), and her husband, Vijay, were accused of robbery by her in-laws in a family dispute over property matters. The couple stays at the P&T Colony in Ranip along with Vijay’s 90-year-old blind mother. Vijay works for the Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited’s Wireless Department.

According to the case details, two of Vijay’s brothers, his four sisters and others had allegedly come to their residence on February 8 and had a fight over the property dispute.

Following the fight, Vijay’s brother, Mahesh, lodged a complaint with the Sabarmati police alleging that Vijay and Ramila had attacked them with a knife and had robbed them of their gold chain.

On the night of February 11, the police arrested the couple when they went to lodge a cross-complaint. They were kept in custody till the evening of February 12, and produced before the metropolitan magistrate, holding the urgent charge, at his residence.

One of Vijay’s relatives alleged that Sub-Inspector G B Vaghela of Sabarmati police kept the couple in custody all through the night and then presented them before the court without keeping a woman constable along with the pregnant woman.

Vaghela evaded answering queries about the alleged illegal conduct on his part.

Solankis’ advocate Jayesh Patel said: “The police did not keep a woman constable with Ramila after arresting her. We demanded a bail for her as she was nine-months-pregnant and was expecting delivery anytime, but the court rejected it and sent them to judicial custody in Sabarmati jail.”

Ramila started experiencing labour pain on February 13, and delivered a boy at the Ahmedabad Civil Hospital, while still in judicial custody.

The next day, Ramila’s advocate moved her bail application in the Metropolitan Court No. 21 on medical grounds, which was granted by the court.

“She was facing robbery charges; however, the court has wide powers in special cases like this to grant bail which it did not exercise in our case at the time of the arrest,” said a family member of Vijay on condition of anonymity.