NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Friday granted bail to civil rights activists Vernon Gonsalves and Arun Ferreira, who have been under arrest since 2018 in the Elgar Parishad-Bhima Koregaon violence case. A bench of justices Aniruddha Bose and Sudhanshu Dhulia said although the “allegations against them were serious”, that cannot be the sole ground to justify their continued detention pending trial.
The court in the 54-page verdict authored by Justice Bose, said mere possession of literature, even if the content thereof inspires or propagates violence, by itself cannot constitute any of the offences under UAPA. “In the case of the appellants, contents of the letters through which the appellants are sought to be implicated are in the nature of hearsay evidence, recovered from co-accused."
Moreover, no covert or overt terrorist act has been attributed to the appellants in these letters, or any other material forming part of records of these two appeals. Reference to the activities of the accused is in the nature of ideological propagation and allegations of recruitment. No evidence of any of the persons who are alleged to have been recruited or have joined this “struggle” inspired by the appellants has been brought before us. Thus, we are unable to accept NIA’s contention that the appellants have committed the offence relating to support given to a terrorist organisation,” the bench said.
The court directed their release subject to the imposition of conditions by the NIA trial court. Additionally, they have been directed to surrender their passports to the NIA and inform the investigating officer about their addresses and mobile phone numbers. It allowed them to have one mobile phone each but asked them to keep them charged and their location status active 24x7 besides pairing them with the NIA’s investigating officer.