Elgar Parishad case: Sudha Bharadwaj allowed access to 5 books per month from outside jail

The special National Investigation Agency (NIA) court on Tuesday allowed access to books from outside the prison, to activist and lawyer Sudha Bharadwaj. The court has, however, asked the prison authorities to check the contents, if they are objectionable, before allowing the same.

Bharadwaj along with Hany Babu and Gautam Navlakha had approached the special court for access to books and newspapers in prison. Their lawyer, on Tuesday, filed an affidavit stating that the prison authorities at Taloja did not allow to deliver books brought by lawyers as well.

Bharadwaj in her petition said the books sent to her in the past few months, by post as well as those brought personally by her lawyers, have been returned repeatedly. “Applicant is a lawyer and a law professor who has spent her life reading and studying books and texts, and she cannot be denied access to books arbitrarily,” read the petition.

The court has now permitted her to have five books from outside the prison. “The superintendent shall carefully examine the books and if they contain objectionable material, which preaches violence, vulgar, obscene, pornographic or the material propagating the banned organisation namely Revolutionary Democratic Front or CPI (Maoist), in that case, he shall not allow the applicant to accept such books,” the court said.

Meanwhile, since the reply on the plea of Babu and Navlakha was not received from Taloja jail, it is kept pending for hearing.