Elgar Parishad accused to attend hearing: HC reserves order on plea

The Bombay high court (HC) has reserved its order on the state’s application seeking directions to Dalit scholar and professor Anand Teltumbde and rights activist

The Bombay high court (HC) has reserved its order on the state’s application seeking directions to Dalit scholar and professor Anand Teltumbde and rights activist Gautam Navlakha to be present during the hearing of their anticipatory bail applications (ABA) in the Elgar Parishad case. The duo has been booked in the case and for allegedly having links to the banned Communist Party of India (Maoist).

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The court had allowed the state’s application on Tuesday. The bench of justice P D Naik on Wednesday said it was reserving its order on the application as well as the ABAs. It said that the parties would be notified accordingly, adding that the interim protection to the duo against arrest would continue till then.

Senior counsel Mihir Desai, representing Teltumbde, expressed surprise over the state’s application, submitting that although 16 to 17 hearings had taken place in the trial court, HC and Supreme Court, the state had never made an application seeking their presence.

Dr Yug Choudhary, senior counsel appearing for Navlakha, said that as the application had not expressed any apprehensions against his clients absconding, tampering with evidence or threatening witnesses, there was no ground for seeking their presence. Navlakha and Teltumbde had already submitted that they were willing to cooperate with the investigators.

Special public prosecutor Aruna Patil submitted that she had already enumerated the reasons for denying bail and hence wanted the court to direct them to be present when orders were passed.