The Supreme Court on Thursday extended the house arrest of five activists who were nabbed for their alleged role in the Bhima-Koregaon case.
The Supreme Court on Thursday extended the house arrest of five activists who were nabbed for their alleged role in the Bhima-Koregaon case.
Prominent Left-wing activists were arrested after Pune police raided across several states as part of a probe into anti-Dalit violence at Koregaon-Bhima village near Pune after the Elgar Parishad conclave on December 31 last year.
Telugu poet Varavara Rao, activists Vernon Gonsalves and Arun Farreira, trade union activist Sudha Bharadwaj and civil liberties activist Gautam Navalakha were arrested following the raids.
On Wednesday, the Maharashtra government told the Supreme Court that the five rights activists were arrested due to the cogent evidence linking them with the banned CPI(Maoist) and not because of their dissenting views.
The state's response came in the backdrop of the court's remark stating that "dissent is the safety valve of democracy".
The Maharashtra police also filed an affidavit in response to a plea of historian Romila Thapar and four others challenging the arrest of the five activists, claiming they were planning to carry out violence in the country and ambush the security forces.
On Monday (September 3), the Bombay High Court also raised an objection to the recent press conference taken by Maharashtra police, sharing with the media, details of letters which they seized from the houses of five activists, arrested
Earlier, the Additional Directorate General of Maharashtra Police defended the arrests of Left-wing activists, saying that those arrested had links with the outlawed Communist Party of India (Maoist) and the police had confiscated documents in April and June establishing links with the Naxal group.
ADG Parambir Singh said that a letter was recovered from Rona Wilson, which was written to one Comrade Prakash, proposing a "Rajiv Gandhi-like incident" to end the "Modi Raj".
The ADG claimed that the letter read, "I hope you have received details of a requirement of Rs. 8 crores for the annual supply of grenade launchers. Comrade Kishan and others have proposed steps to end Modi raj, like Rajiv Gandhi incident."
Police had arrested Sudhir Dhawale, Rona Wilson, Surendra Gadling, Shoma Sen and Mahesh Raut in June while probing the alleged Maoist connection to the Elgar Parishad conclave held in Pune on December 31 last year.
(With agency inputs )
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