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Special NIA Court’s Reasons For Denying Bail To Father Stan Swamy [read order]

Special NIA Court’s Reasons For Denying Bail To Father Stan Swamy [read order]

Special NIA Court’s Reasons For Denying Bail To Father Stan Swamy [read order]

24/03/2021

Live Law / by Sharmeen Hakim

A Special NIA Court, in Mumbai, has held that a police officer’s internal report can be considered while rejecting the bail application of an accused even after a charge sheet has been filed, if the investigating agency was granted permission for further investigation.
Special judge DE Kothalikar cited a last-minute report by an Assistant Investigating Officer to the Superintendent of Police NIA while rejecting 83-year-old tribal rights activist, Father Stan Swamy’s bail application, on Monday.
Read more/read order

Collective interest of community outweighs right of personal liberty of Stan Swamy: Special NIA Court while rejecting bail to Swamy [read order]

23/03/2021

Bar & Bench / by Neha Joshi

The material placed on record prima facie indicated that Swamy was carrying out activities to “overthrow the democracy of the nation”, the Court said.
Collective interest of community will outweigh the right of personal liberty, the Special Court observed on Monday in its order refusing to grant bail to Stan Swamy, accused in the 2018 Bhima Koregaon violence.
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Read order, documented by Bar & Bench (PDF): Fr__Stan_Swamy_v__State_of_Maharashtra

Stan Swamy had hatched a ‘serious conspiracy’ to overthrow government, says NIA court order

23/03/2021

Scroll.in / by Scroll Staff

The 83-year-old Jesuit priest was denied bail by the court on Monday in the Bhima Koregaon violence case.
The special National Investigation Agency court that rejected the bail petition of 83-year-old Jesuit priest and activist Stan Swamy said that prima facie he had conspired with members of a banned Maoist organisation to create unrest in India and to overthrow the government, PTI reported.
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NIA Court Refuses Bail To Stan Swamy In Bhima Koregaon Case

22/03/2021

Live Law / by Sharmeen Hakim

The Special NIA Court Mumbai on Monday refused to grant bail to 83-year-old Father Stan Swamy, a tribal rights activist, from Ranchi, in Jharkhand, accused in the 2018 Bhima Koregaon – Elgaar Parishad case. Special Judge under the NIA Act DE Kothlikar passed the order dismissing the bail application, which had also cited medical grounds on account of Parkinsons disease of Stan Swamy.
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Stan Swamy’s bail plea rejected by NIA court

22/03/2021

Gauri Lankesh News / by Gauri Lankesh News Desk

… Swamy’s lawyer claimed that the evidence allegedly relied upon by the NIA was correspondence with various people to seek legal aid for Swamy’s organisation, Persecuted Prisoners Solidarity Committee (PPSC), which works for undertrial Adivasis and Dalits falsely accused as Maoists…
The NIA chargesheet filed against Swamy had claimed that he is a member of banned organization CPI (Maoist), and that he was given the responsibility of spreading its activities after the arrest of many party members. Purportedly, Swamy was a staunch supporter of organisations like Vistapan Virodhi Jan Vikas Andolan and People’s Union for Civil Liberties involved in activities for CPI (Maoists), it was submitted.
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Special NIA court rejects Stan Swamy’s bail plea

22/03/2021

The Hindu / by Sonam Saigal

He has been working with tribals since decades and is currently lodged at Taloja Central Jail after being arrested from Ranchi on October 9, 2020.
The special National Investigation Agency (NIA) court on Monday rejected the bail plea filed by Jesuit priest Stan Swamy in the Bhima-Koregaon violence case.
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S.M. Mushrif: Secularists should challenge UAPA in Supreme Court

S.M. Mushrif: Secularists should challenge UAPA in Supreme Court

Frontline / by Ziya Us Salam

(Print edition: April 9, 2021)
Interview with S.M. Mushrif, former Inspector General of Police, Maharashtra.
… In the light of Bhima Koregaon and the anti-Citizenship [Amendment] Act protests in Delhi and elsewhere, arbitrary arrests have been made under the UAPA. Many professors, students, poets have been incarcerated for long. Is the law supposed to safeguard the common man or frighten him?
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Our judicial system punishes a person and their family without trial: Koel Sen

Our judicial system punishes a person and their family without trial: Koel Sen


Koel and Shoma Sen

By Koel Sen @ fb

Last Saturday I tried to go to Byculla Jail for a mulakat with Maa but was denied. I was outside the jail waiting for 6 hours !!(I was there from 12.00PM to 6.00PM). They denied me mulakat because I had not come with the verification from the local police station that I am her daughter. Our surnames match and my Aadhar card clearly states that I am d/o of Shoma Sen. Previously I was allowed to meet her on 4-5 instances. I kept telling them that I have already done mulaquat before and that this verification is not a simple process, its taking time. I just wanted to inform my mother that my grandma, her mother-in-law had passed away. But they just kept me hanging there the entire day. I wanted to speak to Superitndnt and he just walked past me and again I waited for 2 more hours for him to get back after his lunch break which lasted from 1.00PM to 4PM. Can you believe ? …

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Video: Livestreamed prayer service / Jesuit Stan Swamy remains in jail, bail postponed again

Video: Livestreamed prayer service / Jesuit Stan Swamy remains in jail, bail postponed again


by Cedric Prakash (March 21):
Do JOIN: Special Day of Prayer and Fast for Fr Stan Swamy and others JCSA is inviting you to a livestreamed prayer service *PRAYING TOGETHER*
Date: Sunday, Mar 21, 2021 07:30 PM Indian Time +++

en | 28min | 2021
Watch @ Youtube here

Jesuit Stan Swamy remains in jail, bail postponed again

18/03/2021

UCA News / by UCA News Reporter

An elderly Indian Jesuit arrested more than five months ago on charges of sedition remains in jail as a special court postponed its verdict on his bail application for the third time.
The verdict on the bail application of 84-year-old Father Stan Swamy was postponed again on March 16 by the special court of the National Investigation Agency (NIA) based in western India’s Mumbai city.
“The frequent postponements have disappointed us,” said Father A. Santhanam, a Jesuit lawyer based in Tamil Nadu state who is closely following the case.
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Second Elgaar Parishad: Sharjeel Usmani appears before Pune police for second time

Second Elgaar Parishad: Sharjeel Usmani appears before Pune police for second time


Poster, Jan 2021

Sharjeel Usmani appears before Pune police for second time in ‘objectionable speech’ case

18/03/2021

The Indian Express / by Express News Service

Usmani was one of the speakers at the event organised at the Ganesh Kala Krida Manch in Pune on January 30 by the ‘Bhima Koregaon Shaurya Din Prerna Abhiyaan’.
Former Aligarh Muslim University (AMU) student leader Sharjeel Usmani, who has been booked for allegedly delivering an objectionable speech at ‘Elgaar Parishad 2021’ on January 30, appeared before Pune City Police for the second time in this case on Thursday.
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Second Elgaar Parishad: govt. to take no coercive action against Sharjeel Usmani

18/03/2021

The Hindu / Special Correspondent

Former AMU student has moved HC seeking to quash FIR.
The Bombay High Court on Monday recorded the statement by the Maharashtra government that it would not take any coercive action against Sharjeel Usmani, an alumnus of Aligarh Muslim University, as long as he appeared before the Pune police for allegedly making objectionable statements at the second Elgaar Parishad.
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Also read: The Making Of Sharjeel Usmani and His Speech At Elgar Parishad (Feb 2021)

The ‘Buts’ To Freedom Of Speech In India / Why Bail to Vara Vara Rao Augurs Well for Indian Democracy

The ‘Buts’ To Freedom Of Speech In India / Why Bail to Vara Vara Rao Augurs Well for Indian Democracy

The BJP’s Toolkit Is Not Working That Well

17/03/2021

The Wire / by Amit Shrivastava

Despite the BJP-RSS’s repression tactics having a terrifying and chilling effect on the right to protest, two of India’s largest movements have taken shape since 2019.
By now, it’s fairly obvious that the NDA government has a standard toolkit for dealing with what it regards as troublesome movements. The script goes like this …
The police stand on the sidelines as first propaganda and then violence is unleashed by either the Sangh parivar organisations or others. We’ve now seen this in JNU (in 2016 and again in 2020), in Bhima Koregaon, in the Republic Day incidents, and most terrible of all, in the Delhi killings of February 2020.
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The ‘Buts’ To Freedom Of Speech In India

17/03/2021

Feminism India / by Guest Writer

A trembling, disillusioned father told his daughter to flee her homeland for her safety. This seems like a plot taken straight from a classic wartime story fraught with separation and grief. In reality, such was the conversation my friend had with her father following the unlawful arrests of activists. The Disha Ravi toolkit case was the last straw.
The ‘buts’ to the freedom of speech in India only seem to point to a dictatorial reality, much like that of Airstrip One in George Orwell’s 1984, where even the mere thought of protest is met with prosecution.
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Why Bail to Vara Vara Rao Augurs Well for Indian Democracy

16/03/2021

NewsClick / by Ajay Gudavarthy

Collective rights cannot remain intact without a collective spirit. The Bombay High Court has shown such compassion lives on in India.
It restores faith in the judiciary and augurs well for Indian democracy that the Bombay High Court has granted bail to revolutionary poet VV Rao on medical grounds. In a sense, the current regime and VV, as he is known among friends, are on opposite ends of the political spectrum.
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Government’s game of prosecution – prosecution as a tool to silence critics

Government’s game of prosecution – prosecution as a tool to silence critics

Frontline / by A.G. Noorani

(Print edition: March 26, 2021)
The present dispensation uses prosecution as a tool to silence critics and opponents in a way that makes the legal process a punishment in itself.
Julio Ribeiro, a prince among police officers of the highest rank, notable alike for his high integrity and superb efficiency, rendered a great service by bringing home to the Indian reader the allegations of manipulating and planting in the Bhima Koregaon case. He had heard Mark Spencer, head honcho of Arsenal Consulting, a private digital forensics company. Ribeiro had heard Spencer on an Indian national TV channel “certifying that the police in India had been taken for a ride by an extremely clever hacker”. His article in The Indian Express on February 22 is entitled “The truth is out there” under the sub-heading “Allegations of manipulating and planting evidence in Bhima Koregaon case must be investigated.
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Women reject state surveillance – Women are not a “problem”

Women reject state surveillance – Women are not a “problem”

Poster campaign, March 8, 2021. Click to enlarge

The Green Left / by Kavita Krishnan

Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Chouhan has proposed that every woman stepping out of her home be required to register herself with her local police station so that the police can track her for her safety.
Chief Justice Sharad Arvind Bobde asked last month why women had been “kept” at the farmers’ protests and praised Supreme Court advocate AP Singh (a man with a record of victim-blaming and support for honour crimes) for giving an assurance that women would be sent home and kept out of the protests…
It is no coincidence, after all, that some of the inspiring Indian feminist figures of our times (to name a few — advocate Sudha Bharadwaj and teacher Shoma Sen, student activists Natasha Narwal and Devangana Kalita of Pinjra Tod, Ishrat Jahan and Gulfisha) are in prison today under draconian laws, and no judge seems able to see and end the appalling injustice of their incarceration.
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