Bhima Koregaon case: SC grants regular bail to Varavara Rao on medical grounds

India

oi-Madhuri Adnal

NewDelhi, Aug 10: The Supreme Court granted regular bail to activist and poet Dr P Varavara Rao, an accused in the 2018 Bhima Koregaon violence case, on medical grounds.

The 83-year-old, said that he had challenged the Bombay High Court order as he was not granted an extension of bail, despite his advanced age and precarious and deteriorating health condition, and has been denied the prayer to shift to Hyderabad.

He was arrested on August 28, 2018, from his home in Hyderabad and is an under-trial in the Bhima Koregaon case for which FIR was lodged by the Pune Police at Vishrambagh Police Station on January 8, 2018, under various sections of IPC and several provisions of UAPA.

Initially, Rao said that he was put under house arrest pursuant to the order of the apex court and ultimately on November 17, 2018, he was taken into police custody and later shifted to Taloja Jail.

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On February 22, 2021, the Bombay High Court granted him bail on medical grounds and was released from jail on March 6, 2021. Giving extensive details of his health conditions including suffering in the jail, Rao said that the order of the Bombay High Court dated February 22, 2021, had contemplated that the Petitioner could be on medical bail for an extended period, and even permanently, on medical grounds depending on his medical condition supported by medical examination reports.

On April 13, the High Court had rejected the plea but had extended the time for the 83-year-old activist to surrender before the Taloja prison authorities by three months, to enable him to undergo cataract surgery.

It had also dismissed Rao’s application seeking that he be permitted to stay in Hyderabad instead of Mumbai, while out on bail.

The High Court had said it had found substance in several claims made by Rao’s counsel on lack of medical facilities in the Taloja prison, located in neighbouring Navi Mumbai, and poor hygiene conditions there.

The court had, therefore, directed the Maharashtra Inspector General of prisons to submit a “candid” report on the state of such facilities at the “Taloja prison in particular,” and also in all prisons across the state.

The case pertains to alleged inflammatory speeches made at the Elgar Parishad conclave held in Pune on December 31, 2017, which, the police claimed, triggered violence the next day near the Koregaon-Bhima war memorial located on the outskirts of the western Maharashtra city.

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The Pune police had also claimed the conclave was organised by people with alleged Maoist links.

Later, the National Investigation Agency (NIA) took over the probe into the case.