The Bombay High Court on Friday rejected the default bail petitions of five persons accused in the Bhima Koregaon case, Bar and Bench reported.
A division bench of Justices AS Gadkari and Shyam C Chandak issued the order on petitions filed by lawyer Surendra Gadling, activist and researcher Rona Wilson, poet and political commentator Sudhir Dhawale, forest rights activist Mahesh Raut, and former Nagpur University professor Shoma Sen.
The petitioners are among the 16 academicians, activists and lawyers who have been charged under the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act for their alleged role in instigating caste violence at Bhima Koregaon near Pune in January 2018.
They had moved the High court challenging special court orders in 2022 that denied them default bail. The High Court had concluded hearing the petitions on May 3, The Indian Express reported.
Under Section 167(2) of the Code of Criminal Procedure 1973, an accused person can only be held in custody up to a particular time. After this period, they have to be given bail if the police do not file a chargesheet. Bail under this section is referred to as default bail or compulsory bail.
Gadling moved the High Court against a special court’s order from June 28, 2022 that rejected his default bail application, Bar and Bench reported. Raut, Wilson, Dhawale and Sen challenged a similar order of the special court from June 26, 2022.
Although Raut was granted regular bail by the High Court in September last year, the same bench stayed the order after the National Investigation Agency said it would file an appeal against it. The Supreme Court then extended the stay imposed by the High Court.
Raut, who was arrested in June 2018 in the Bhima Koregaon case, is still in custody, along with Gadling, Wilson and Dhawale.
In April, Sen was released from jail, days after she was granted regular bail by the Supreme Court in the case. She had been in jail since June 2018.
In May, activist Gautam Navlakha, also listed as an accused, was granted bail, making him the seventh person in the case to do so.
Activists Vernon Gonsalves and Arun Ferreira got default bail in the case in July last year, while Sudha Bharadwaj was granted default bail in 2021.
Anand Teltumbe received bail in 2022. Varavara Rao was granted bail on medical grounds in 2022.
One of the accused persons, tribal rights activist Stan Swamy, died in custody at a Mumbai hospital on July 5, 2021, nearly nine months after he was arrested. The 84-year-old suffered from multiple ailments, including Parkinson’s disease, and contracted COVID-19 while being held at a prison in Taloja.
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