Elgar Parishad-Maoist links case: HC grants bail to two accused

The Bombay High Court on Wednesday granted bail to researcher Rona Wilson and activist Sudhir Dhawale arrested in the Elgar ParishadMaoist links case noting that they were in jail since 2018 and the trial was yet to startA division bench of Justices A S Gadkari and Kamal Khata said the two had spent more than six years in jail as undertrial prisonersThey are in jail since 2018 Even the charges in the case are yet to be framed The prosecution has cited over 300 witnesses and thus there is no possibility of the trial to conclude in the near future the court saidA trial starts after the charges are framedThe NIA the prosecution agency did not seek a stay to the HC orderDefence lawyers Mihir Desai and Sudeep Pasbola had argued that the two accused were incarcerated since their arrest in the caseWhile granting relief the high court said it was not dealing with the merits of the case at this stageWilson and Dhawale were directed to submit a surety of Rs one lakh each and appear before the special NIA court for the trial hearingThey shall surrender their passports and not leave the city until the trial is over the HC saidRona Wilson was arrested in June 2018 from his home in Delhi He was described by the probe agencies as one of the top brass of urban MaoistsDhawale was accused of being an active member of the banned Communist Party of India MaoistApart from Dhawale and Wilson 14 other activists were arrested in the case Eight of them Varavara Rao Sudha Bharadwaj Anand Teltumbde Vernon GonsalvesArun Ferreira Shoma Sen Gautam Navlakha and Mahesh Raut have been granted bail till nowMahesh Raut remained in jail as the appeal filed by the NIA against his bail is pending before the Supreme Court But on Tuesday the special NIA court granted him interim bail for 18 days to enable him appear for an LLB examStan Swamy one of the accused died in 2021 while in prisonThe case pertains to provocative speeches allegedly delivered at the Elgar Parishad conclave held in Pune on December 31 2017 triggering violence at KoregaonBhima in Pune district the next dayThe Pune police had claimed the conclave was backed by the MaoistsThe NIA later took over the probeThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever