A judge in Gujarat on Thursday filed for anticipatory bail at a local court fearing arrest by the Central Bureau of Investigation in the Bilkis Banu case.

Executive magistrate Chandubhai Patel, from Limkheda taluka in Dahod district, filed the application before the district sessions court and the matter will be heard on March 1, advocate Arvind Pandya said in Ahmedabad on Friday.

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The court had earlier rejected the anticipatory bail plea of three policemen, including a deputy superintendent, who were part of the team that initially investigated the case.

In its report to the Supreme Court on Wednesday, the CBI had indicted the Gujarat police for poor investigation. The court then granted it three more months to probe the case.

Bilkis Yakoob Rasool alias Bilkis Banu, a resident of Randhikpur in Dahod, was five months pregnant when a mob allegedly raped her and killed 14 members of her family following the Godhra violence. The dead were then buried nearby.

After the Supreme Court intervened in the case following Bilkis's appeal to the court against the Gujarat government closing the matter on a technicality, her case was handed over to the CBI.

The agency discovered that some of the bodies had been buried with salt to speed up decomposition. It also exhumed the skeletons and sent them for forensic tests.

It also arrested 13 people, including a Bharatiya Janata Party leader, in connection with the case.