There was nothing in the so-called Maoist communications produced by the police to incriminate Nagpur University Professor Shoma Sen, submitted her defence counsel before the Pune sessions court on Friday.
Advocate Rahul Deshmukh, Ms. Sen’s counsel, further told the court that there were no grounds for her prolonged incarceration based on the Pune police’s flimsy evidence against her.
“None of the Maoist letters allegedly seized from the arrested activists and publicised by the police are written directly to Ms. Sen. Her name is mentioned in some of the letters written by someone and addressed to somebody else about allegedly giving her funds pertaining to the ‘Elgaar Parishad’ and for other supposedly propaganda purposes. This kind of ‘evidence’ is untenable,” submitted advocate Mr. Deshmukh, arguing that there was no reason for holding Ms. Sen in jail.
He further said that among the charges levelled against her by the Pune police was her alleged role in the ‘Elgaar Parishad’ that was held a day before the Bhima-Koregaon clashes and in receiving funds allegedly used to foment the clashes.
“Even after more than half-a-year of investigating this case, the Pune police have yet to discover the source of funding for the ‘Elgaar Parishad’. Furthermore, retired justices B.G. Kolse-Patil and P.B. Sawant have already said they were the main organisers of the Parishad and provided the funding for it. So, why aren’t they being questioned by the agencies?” Mr. Deshmukh observed.
Ms. Sen, along with human rights lawyer Surendra Gadling, Dalit activist-publisher Sudhir Dhawale, and activists Mahesh Raut and Rona Wilson were arrested by the city police on June 6 for their alleged links with the outlawed Communist Party of India (Maoist) and the Bhima-Koregaon clashes.
On August 28, in a second countrywide crackdown, the Pune police arrested activists Varavara Rao, Arun Ferreira, Vernon Gonsalves, Sudha Bharadwaj and Gautam Navlakha on similar charges.
Special judge K.D. Wadane has scheduled the next hearing on October 15, where it would take up the bail pleas of Ms. Bharadwaj and Mr. Gonsalves.
Earlier, on October 10, the court heard the bail plea of advocate Gadling.
Conducting his own defence, Mr. Gadling said that the letters publicised by the Pune police alleging the arrested activists to have strong Maoist links were “fabricated” and “full of mere insinuations”.
Dubbing the Pune police’s probe as ‘tainted’, Mr. Gadling said that he had received a number of threats by the Maharashtra police as he used to take up cases of tribals and other activists labeled as ‘Naxal sympathisers’.
Proclaiming his innocence during the course of his hearing, Mr. Gadling had said: “Some of the so-called Maoist communications revealed by the Pune police as evidence against us are addressed to a Comrade Surendra and mentions a Maoist by the name of ‘Comrade Sai’. These are insinuations against me and my client. This ‘evidence’ is completely manufactured.”
