A sessions court in Pune on Friday ordered that copies of forensic science laboratory reports be provided to Surendra Gadling, Arun Ferreira, two of the accused in the Bhima Koregaon violence case.

The court said that the accused wanted access to the files the forensic science laboratory has stored in the form of hard disks, compact disks, DVDs and pen drives. The court, however, added that only those documents which have been submitted to the court by the investigating officer in the case can be copied and provided to the accused.

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Judge KD Vadane said that an extra copy of the documents should also be prepared. He added in his order that video shooting should be done while the documents are copied.

The prosecution had argued that the documents could be misused as some of the accused are still absconding, in the light of “highly sensitive data regarding Naxal activities where the accused persons conspired a plot against the constitutional authority of India”.

Five activists are accused of organising the Elgaar Parishad event to mark the 200th year of the battle of Bhima Koregaon on December 31, 2017. The Pune Police claim incendiary speeches at this conference led to planned violence at Bhima Koregaon village on January 1 and 2, 2018.

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The police arrested activists Sudha Bharadwaj, Varavara Rao, Arun Ferreira, Vernon Gonsalves and banned Communist Party of India (Maoist) leader Ganapathy in connection with the Bhima Koregaon case in August last year.

In February, they filed a supplementary charges against the four activists and Ganapathy. The police had filed its first chargesheet in the case at a special court for Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act in November last year. It had named activists Sudhir Dhawale, Rona Wilson, Surendra Gadling, Shoma Sen, Mahesh Raut, all of whom were arrested in June 2018.