New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Tuesday (May 14) lifted the stay on the bail granted to rights activist Gautam Navlakha, who was arrested in the Elgar Parishad case. The Bombay high court had granted Navlakha bail on December 19 last year, but the court had then agreed to a three-week stay on its decision in which the National Investigation Agency could approach the Supreme Court.
Navlakha had been arrested on April 14, 2020. Since November 19, 2022, he has been under house arrest in Mumbai. The NIA has sought to retrieve the “cost” of the security cover Navlakha’s house arrest from him, and has now quoted a figure of more than Rs 1.7 crore. The court had earlier said that the accused was liable to pay the cost.
On Tuesday, the bench of Justices M.M. Sundresh and S.V.N. Bhatti stated that there was no reason to extend the stay further, since others in the case too have been granted bail and Navlakha has been incarcerated for four years now. It said that Navlakha must deposit Rs 20 lakh as security cover for the house arrest costs, and that would be a precondition for his bail, LiveLaw reported.
“We are inclined to not extend the stay as high court order is detailed in granting bail. Trial would take years and years and years for completion. Without going at length into contentions, we will not extend the stay,” Bar and Bench quoted the court as saying.
The Elgar Parishad case, in which 16 rights activists, lawyers, writers and academics were arrested, has come under severe criticism over the years. The investigating agencies have been accused of using hackers to plant evidence on the electronic devices of the accused.
In April, Shoma Sen was granted bail in the case. In 2021, trade unionist and lawyer Sudha Bharadwaj got default bail.
In 2022, activist Anand Teltumbde got bail on merits. In 2022, poet Varavara Rao was given bail by the Supreme Court on medical grounds.
In 2023, Vernon Gonsalves and Arun Ferreira also got bail on merits. Mahesh Raut was also given bail by the Bombay high court on merits, but the order was stayed by the same court and extended by the Supreme Court, as Navlakha’s bail was until today.
Amidst fervent pleas by the families of the accused for attention to an alleged lack of medical care, one of them, Father Stan Swamy, passed away in custody in July 2021 while the COVID pandemic raged.
Those who are still in prison are Jyoti Jagtap, Sagar Gorkhe, Ramesh Gaichor, Raut, Surendra Gadling, Sudhir Dhawale, Rona Wilson and Hany Babu.
