The Bombay high court on Friday directed the National Investigation Agency to get poet-activist Varavara Rao medically examined at the Nanavati hospital in north west Mumbai to check if he suffered from any ailments that warranted extension of his medical bail.
The 83-year-old, who has challenged the Bombay high court's April 13 order rejecting his plea for permanent bail on medical grounds, is currently on interim bail on medical grounds and he was to surrender on July 12.
Home Minister Rajnath Singh on Tuesday called Maoists a 'national challenge' which he said the government has accepted and will fight it. On a day-long visit to Chhattisgarh, a day after Maoists killed 14 Central Reserve Police Force personnel in Sukma district, he also announced a compensation of Rs 38 lakh each to the kin of victims of the Naxal ambush and Rs 65,000 each to the injured.
'...incarcerated in jails, ruining their entire families.' 'You would see that Dalits who displayed so much agitation over the Bhima-Koregaon issue are effectively silenced by the arrests of their activists by the police.' 'What can be a more pitiable state than this for a people who had just seen a ray of hope after darkness of millennia?'
Pakistani intelligence agency Inter-Services Intelligence is having close liaison with some pro-Naxal overground organisations through banned Students Islamic Movement of India in West Bengal and helping them to instigate people against the government, a top police officer of the state said on Thursday.
Navlakha approached the HC last year, challenging the special NIA court's order of July 12, 2020 that rejected his plea for statutory bail.
The Supreme Court on Wednesday granted bail to poet and activist P Varavara Rao on medical grounds in the Bhima-Koregaon case.
The police on Thursday booked litterateur Hiren Gohain, Krishak Mukti Sangram Samiti chief Gogoi and senior journalist Manjit Mahanta under sedition charges for their comments on the Citizenship Amendment Bill.
'Why he wasn't released, and why he had to die in custody?'
Seven persons accused of being involved in smuggling activities for Sri Lanka's Tamil Tiger rebels and the Maoist movement have been detained under the National Security Act (NSA). While three of them were involved in smuggling activities for the LTTE, the others were part of the Maoist movement, a release said.
The case pertains to the organisation of Elgar Parishad in Pune on December 31, 2017 which promoted enmity between various caste groups and led to violence, resulting in the loss of life and property and statewide agitation in Maharashtra, an NIA spokesperson said.
The National Investigation Agency (NIA) told the Bombay high court on Thursday that the agency has denied the claims of tampering of electronic evidence in the Elgar Parishad-Maoists Links case that were made by a United States-based forensic firm.
Union minister Prakash Javadekar said everybody should have condemned such an attempt, more so as India has lost two prime ministers to violence.
For four days, the officer avoided giving any straight answers, becoming the first witness in the 48 witnesses that have appeared so far, to have achieved this feat.
Senior counsel Mihir Desai, who represented Swamy in the high court, said that although the activist was dead and there existed no question of him being granted bail any more, the high court need not consider the late priest's appeals seeking bail abated.
Supreme Court on Tuesday granted bail to Soni Sori, a tribal teacher, and journalist Lingaram Kodopi in a case lodged against them for allegedly receiving money from Essar Group on behalf of Maoists.
Rashmi Shukla's testimony comes as a revelation because the proceedings of the Elgar Parishad form the basis of the Bhima Koregaon case which has become an international cause celebre.
On January 1 in 2018, violence erupted at an event to mark 100 years of the Bhima-Koregaon battle, leaving one dead and several injured, including 10 policemen.
Teltumbde later termed the police's case against him and several other social activists as 'harassment' and a ploy to 'humiliate' them.
Jyoti Punwani reports on the strange case of Prashant Rahi, MTech, journalist, activist, now in solitary confinement in a Maharashtra prison.
The accused were initially placed under house arrest in August last year by the Pune Police in Maharashtra and were later taken into custody on October 26, after a sessions court in Pune rejected their bail pleas.
'The category of crime and criminals called Maoist or Naxal or #UrbanNaxals is an illegitimate creation of right-wing propaganda media frenzy.' 'It is a fiction repugnant to the Constitution and the law of the land,' argue Vernon Gonsalves and Arun Ferreira.
The panel had earlier summoned Pawar in 2020, but he could not appear before it due to the coronavirus-induced lockdown. Later, another summons was issued to Pawar for appearing before the commission on February 23 and 24 this year, but the senior politician had sought a fresh date, saying he wanted to file an additional affidavit before recording his testimony.
ACP Shivaji Pawar has been asked to file his affidavit by August 15.
She has been in custody as an undertrial since her arrest in 2018.
Dominic Xavier is puzzled by the NIA's campaign against Leftist activists and intellectuals and wonders if we will ever get to know the truth behind all these arrests.
It took a five-day hunger strike by the former Delhi University professor, in jail without a break for five years after being convicted of links with Maoists, for the jail administration to agree to his request for a water bottle.
A West Bengal minister on Tuesday hinted at the Maoist connection of Sankrail police officer-in-charge Atindranath Dutta, who had been kidnapped by the Naxalites on October 20 and was released after two days.
Two trade union leaders and the wife of one of them were detained in connection with investigations into Maoist network in the national capital, police sources said in New Delhi on Tuesday.
A police official said the five arrested are suspected to have Maoist links and had allegedly funded the Elgar Parishad conclave.
'We urge you to take remedial measures to address this blatant injustice pending withdrawal of the case against them,' the MPs write.
The top court also expunged adverse remarks of the Delhi high court against the National Investigation Agency made in its May 27 order while dealing with the bail plea.
Will the latest development see a marked break from the way the case has been going?
'Saibaba has 19 ailments, including severe heart and kidney problems.' 'Even healthy persons find their systems failing after Covid.' 'What will happen to someone like Saibaba?', Professor G N Saibaba's wife asks Jyoti Punwani.
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 church authorities said Swamy's body will be cremated in Mumbai after completing certain formalities and his ashes will be taken to Ranchi and Jamshedpur in Jharkhand, the state where he was based.
Some of the letters exchanged between the arrested activists spoke of planning 'some big action' which would attract attention, Singh said.
'What is surprising is that the police press conference was based on letters (allegedly written by the activists).' 'Now those letters, according to the police, are yet to be verified by their (forensic) laboratory.' 'So, even the police is not sure that those letters are genuine.'
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.
Labelling the NIA as a 'mere political tool' of the BJP government at the Centre, Gogoi said the judgment will be a landmark for those arrested through the misuse of the two anti-terror laws.
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