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Jailed Gautam Navlakha seeks to be under house arrest, SC notice to NIA, Maha
The 70-year-old activist was challenging a Bombay high court ruling that rejected his plea for house arrest over apprehensions of lack of adequate medical and other basic facilities in Taloja jail near Mumbai where he is currently lodged.
The National Investigation Agency (NIA) and the Maharashtra government were issued notices by the Supreme Court on Tuesday regarding a petition from jailed activist Gautam Navlakha that he be placed under house arrest instead of judicial custody in the Elgar-Parishad case.
Th top court bench of Justices KM Joseph and Hrishikesh Roy sought the responses of the agency and the state government and posted the matter for further hearing on September 29.
The 70-year-old activist was challenging a Bombay high court ruling that dismissed his plea for house arrest over apprehensions of lack of adequate medical and other basic facilities in Taloja jail near Mumbai where he is currently lodged.
Also read | Special NIA court rejects Gautam Navlakha’s bail plea
He arrested over a violence that broke out near the Koregaon-Bhima war memorial on the outskirts of Pune a day after alleged inflammatory speeches were delivered at the Elgar Parishad conclave on December 31, 2017.
According to the Pune police, the conclave was organised by people with Maoist links. The NIA later took over the probe.
During the hearing in the apex court, Navlakha's counsel said the petitioner had moved the high court on the basis of the top court's May last year order passed on a plea by the jailed activist.
In its last order, the SC had expressed concerns over overcrowding in jails and said it will be open for the courts to consider ordering house arrest of accused under provisions of the Criminal Procedure Code.
"Based on this order, we had moved the Bombay High Court saying that I (Navlakha) in fact fulfil all the criteria that this court had laid down in this matter and please allow house arrest because I am in bad medical condition. I am 70-year-old. I have been under house arrest before as also I have no previous criminal antecedents," the counsel said.
The counsel further said there are allegations about commission of offences covered under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, but none of those are made out against the petitioner.
The counsel said, if the apex court so directs, Navlakha can be put under house arrest in Mumbai, where his two sisters live, or in Delhi.
On August 29, apex court judge Justice S Ravindra Bhat had recused from hearing Navlakha's plea.
The high court had said Navlakha's apprehensions about the lack of medical aid and inadequate basic facilities at the Taloja prison, where he is currently lodged as an undertrial, were "ill-founded".
The apex court had earlier granted bail to 82-year-old activist P Varavara Rao in the case.
Navlakha had told the high court the Taloja prison is overcrowded, the toilets dirty and that his medical condition deteriorated during his incarceration there.
He had moved the high court contending the Taloja prison had poor facilities. He further said he was denied a chair, a pair of slippers, his spectacles, and a PG Wodehouse book by the prison superintendent.
(With inputs from agencies)
