MUMBAI: The Bombay high court on Tuesday granted a three-day temporary bail to activist Ramesh Muralidhar Gaichor, arrested in connection with the 2018 Bhima Koregaon or Elgar Parishad case, to visit his aged father. Noting that Gaichor has not been able to visit his father in the past four years, the court ordered his release on a surety of ₹25,000 from September 9 to September 11.
A division bench of justices Ajay Gadkari and Rajesh Patil noted that Gaichor’s father was 76 years old and had been admitted to a Pune hospital on June 26 and discharged on June 27. The court said, “The appellant, since the date of arrest, was not allowed to meet his father for more than 4 years. Therefore, we are permitting the appellant to be released on temporary bail for three days to enable him to meet his father.”
Gaichor is one of the many anti-caste activists and scholars who were arrested in connection with violence that broke out at a conclave in Bhima Koregaon village in Pune on New Year’s Eve in 2017. As per the court’s records, Gaichor was arrested on September 7, 2020. Earlier in 2025 he applied for bail at a trial court, but on July 1, his plea was rejected. On July 28, he had filed a petition challenging the rejection of his bail application.
Gaichor told the bench that the trial court had failed to consider that his plea was on humanitarian grounds to visit his 75 years old ailing father. He highlighted that the co-accused Surendra Gadling and Rona Wilson have also been granted temporary bail by the court on humanitarian grounds. His petition added that despite his co-occused being granted bail, the special judge had said that there was no genuineness in his plea.
{{/usCountry}}Gaichor told the bench that the trial court had failed to consider that his plea was on humanitarian grounds to visit his 75 years old ailing father. He highlighted that the co-accused Surendra Gadling and Rona Wilson have also been granted temporary bail by the court on humanitarian grounds. His petition added that despite his co-occused being granted bail, the special judge had said that there was no genuineness in his plea.
{{/usCountry}}Senior advocate Mihir Desai, representing Gaichor, said that the accused has not been able to meet his father since his arrest, for which, the special court has failed to consider the humanitarian aspect. Advocate Sandesh Patil, representing the National Investigative Agency (NIA), had initially opposed the bail application, but after looking through the Gaichor’s father’s medical documents, he said that the certificates were genuine.
The case is related to an event, the Elgar Parishad, held at Pune’s Shaniwarwada to mark the 200th anniversary of the Bhima Koregaon battle. Violence broke out on January 1, 2018, with the police alleging that the conclave had been organised by Maoist groups. One person died in the violence and several were injured. The National Investigative Agency (NIA), which is investigating the case, has accused Gaichor of “propagating Naxal activities and Maoist ideology”.
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