HEAD: NIA court refuses to release Gonsalves, Ferreira on cash bail

ELGAR PARISHAD CASE MUMBAI: Elgar Parishad case accused Vernon Gonsalves and Arun Ferreira will have to wait for a few more days to walk out of prison, as the special NIA court on Monday rejected their plea to be released on a cash bond

ELGAR PARISHAD CASE

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MUMBAI: Elgar Parishad case accused Vernon Gonsalves and Arun Ferreira will have to wait for a few more days to walk out of prison, as the special NIA court on Monday rejected their plea to be released on a cash bond. The court has asked them to submit two sureties of ₹50,000 each.

After the Supreme Court granted them bail, Gonsalves and Ferreira’s lawyers on Monday moved the sessions court to fix the conditions for their release on bail and requested the court to allow cash bail, as arranging sureties would delay their release. The court rejected the prayer.

One of the court’s conditions for release on bail pertains to the appellants’ phones being active and charged 24/7. “During this (bail) period… both appellants shall keep the location status of their mobile phones active, 24 hours a day, and their phones shall be paired with that of the Investigating Officer of the NIA to enable him, at any given time, to identify the appellants’ exact location,” the court said in the terms and conditions.

The appellants are also forbidden to talk about the case on any platform or to the media and have been ordered not to influence any witnesses or tamper with evidence. In case of any breach, the court has given liberty to the NIA to move for cancellation of their bail.

In May last year, the accused in the case, including Gonsalves and Ferreira, filed pleas before the Supreme Court against the Bombay high court’s December 2021 judgment refusing them default bail. They contended that there was an error in the judgment and, consequently, prayed that they be granted bail.

Lawyer Vernon Gonsalves is among the activists, lawyers, poets and scholars arrested by the NIA in connection with alleged inflammatory speeches made at the Elgar Parishad conclave held in Pune on December 31, 2017. This, the police claimed, triggered violence the next day near the Koregaon-Bhima war memorial, leaving one dead and several injured. The NIA claimed the accused had Maoist links and indulged in “anti-national activities”.