Pune police on Tuesday raided homes of prominent Left-wing activists in several states and arrested at least five of them -- poet Varavara Rao in Hyderabad, activists Vernon Gonzalves and Arun Ferreira in Mumbai, trade unionist and lawyer Sudha Bhardwaj in Faridabad and Chhattisgarh and civil liberties activist Gautam Navalakha in Delhi.
Khalid said that he was informed by Mevani about the threats, and he has not received any call himself till now.
The Bombay high court, while hearing posthumously the appeals filed by late Jesuit priest Stan Swamy in the Elgar Parishad-Maoist links case, on Monday said he was a wonderful person and the court had 'great respect' for his work.
Opposition leaders and activists hit out at the Centre after the death of Jesuit priest and activist Stan Swamy on Monday, saying it should be held accountable for the "ruthless" and "inhuman treatment" meted out to the 84-year-old who was suffering from multiple ailments and awaiting bail on medical grounds.
She has been in custody as an undertrial since her arrest in 2018.
The FIR against him was re-registered in January 2020, and Navlakha had surrendered before the NIA on April 14, last year. According to the prosecution, some activists allegedly made inflammatory speeches and provocative statements at the Elgar Parishad meet in Pune on December 31, 2017, which triggered violence at Koregaon Bhima in the district the next day.
The sessions court had on Friday rejected Teltumbde's anticipatory bail application.
A police official said the five arrested are suspected to have Maoist links and had allegedly funded the Elgar Parishad conclave.
The larger conspiracy of Communist Party of India-Maoists was to overthrow the democratic system in the country, and the accused were working in that direction, the chargesheet claimed.
District and Sessions Judge K D Vadane sent the two activists to police custody after district government pleader and public prosecutor Ujjwala Pawar argued in the court that since all the accused were under house arrest as per the Supreme Court's directions, they could not be interrogated in connection with the case.
Swamy's counsel said there was negligence on part of the Taloja prison authorities, who failed to provide immediate medical attention to the Jesuit priest.
Teltumbde, Navlakha and nine other civil liberties activists have been booked under the stringent provisions of Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA) for having alleged Maoist links and conspiring to overthrow the government.
Testimony presented before the Bhima Korgaon Commission over the last two months reveals the background to the violence that broke out on January 1, 2018.
Navlakha, who had surrendered before the NIA on April 14 in pursuance to the Supreme Court's direction and was lodged in Tihar jail, was taken to Mumbai by train on May 26.
Fadnavis said the decision of the top court proved that there was no conspiracy behind action by the state police against Varavara Rao, Arun Ferreira, Vernon Gonsalves, Sudha Bharadwaj and Gautam Navlakha.
At his farewell function, CJI Dipak Misra said that tears of a poor man is equal to tears of a rich man.
Rao, 82, an accused in the Elgar Parishad-Maoist links case being probed by the National Investigation Agency (NIA), is currently undergoing treatment in the Mumbai-based Nanavati Hospital where he had been admitted by the Maharashtra government following the high court's intervention.
Justice Anup J Bhambhani, who conducted the hearing through video conferencing, said there was an evident haste shown by the NIA in moving pleas across Mumbai and Delhi over weekends and Gazetted holidays (Eid) and obtaining orders by e-mail, and 'whisking away' Navlakha to Mumbai, which has rendered these proceedings infructuous.
The letter was seized during nationwide raids conducted by the Pune police in connection with the case following which these activists were arrested, he said.
The Bharatiya Janata Party's carping ally said the police assertion about security threat to Prime Minister Narendra Modi from Maoists was just a 'conspiracy theory'.
Talking to reporters in Kolhapur, Pawar said it was not right on the part of the Centre to hand over the probe into the case, which was with the Pune police, to the NIA as law and order was a state subject. NCP leader and Home Minister Anil Deshmukh said Uddhav Thackeray had overruled him on the probe in the case.
Some of the letters exchanged between the arrested activists spoke of planning 'some big action' which would attract attention, Singh said.
Maharashtra police on Tuesday raided the homes of prominent Left-wing activists in several states and arrested at least five of them for suspected Maoist links. Near simultaneous searches were carried out at the residences of prominent Telugu poet Varavara Rao in Hyderabad, activists Vernon Gonzalves and Arun Farreira in Mumbai, trade union activist Sudha Bhardwaj in Faridabad, and civil liberties activist Gautam Navalakha in New Delhi. Subsequently, Rao, Bhardwaj and Farreira were arrested. Although Navalakha was also arrested, the Delhi high court ordered police not to take him out of the national capital at least until Wednesday. According to unconfirmed reports, others whose residences were raided are Susan Abraham, Kranthi Tekula, Father Stan Swamy in Ranchi and Anand Teltumbde in Goa. The raids were carried out as part of a probe into the violence between Dalits and the upper caste Peshwas at Koregaon-Bhima village near Pune after an event called Elgar Parishad, or conclave, on December 31 last year. Here are their brief profiles:
'They have realised that class war is not possible in India, so they are trying to bring about a caste war.'
Justice S Muralidhar on Thursday apprised judges and lawyers of the Delhi high court about the sequence of communication on his transfer to Punjab and Haryana high court, saying that he was informed about it on February 17 and had no problem with it.
If the Bhima Koregaon commission is terminated before completing its work, the people affected by the violence 'would feel cheated'.
'This is how Narendra Modi-Amit Shah rule. They are now announcing that these arrested Naxalites want to kill Modi.'
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