The Civil Liberties Committee of Telangana and Andhra Pradesh has initiated a campaign across the two states, demanding repeal of Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act under which professor of Delhi University G.N.Saibaba and four others were convicted by the Gadchiroli Sessions Court.
As part of the campaign, signatures were collected by the committee on Thursday, also demanding bail for all the five, and medical treatment to Prof. Saibaba.
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No precedents
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A statement from CLC condemned the judgement and said usually punishments are awarded differentially to each accused, based on their respective roles in the crime. But in this case, all the five were awarded life sentence.
The police has violated the rules under the Indian Evidence Act, and Information Technology Act, the statement alleged, and said the prosecution produced only one independent witness, with the rest all being policemen.
All the precedents were ignored, and the judge based the verdict solely on his thoughts and intentions, the statement added.
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SC judgment
The statement pointed out that Supreme Court’s judgment that discovery of Maoist party literature itself was not grounds for incrimination of a person, and wondered if the same was not applicable to lower courts.
“The verdict was pre-judged, with no substance or direct evidence. We have initiated this campaign to tell the public that this judgment is against democratic voices of this country. We are also demanding for repeal of UAPA Act,” S.Seshaiah from CLC said.