Behind bars since April 14, 2020, Dr Anand Teltumbde a well-known academic, will through his counsel, Mihir Desai interrogating the anomalies in investigation and prosecution by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) apart from seriously questioning the mode and matter of garnering evidence in connection with his name being tragged into the Bhima Koregaon conspiracy case.
Making a start on arguments today about 3.30 P.M., and arguing that any terrorist activist involves violence, senior counsel Mihir Desai, made out a strong argument for bail and pointed out that it was not even the NIA’s case that Dr Teltumbde was involved in any kind of violence. Desai further emphasised that if the Court felt that the renowned academic could not be convicted based on the evidence available in the charge sheet then he must be entitled to bail.
After hearing the matter for under an hour, Justices Sunil Shukre and GA Sanap of the Bombay High Court adjourned the matter to tomorrow, Thursday, March 31. The appeal was against the NIA Court’s rejection of the Bail in July 12, 2021. This is an appeal under Section 21 of the NIA Act r/w section 43-D of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act. This petition relies on the Arsenal reports dated February 8, 2021 and March 7, 2021 that expose the unreliability of the evidence that the prosecution has used to build the case against Teltumbde. This appeal also makes a strong case against the incarceration of the appellant (Dr Anand Teltumbde by creating fake and fabricated documents in order to falsely implicate the appellant
The second is a writ petition under Article 226 is a Constitutional Challenge to section section 43D(5) of Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967. Also under challenge is a judgement of the Supreme Court in National Investigation Agency v. Zahoor Ahmad Shah Watali (2019) 5 SCC 1 that has laid down the present interpretation of the law under Article 141 of the Constitution of India.
Born into a family of landless labourers, well known academic, Dr Tembtumbde is a BE in Mechanical Engineering from VNIT, Nagpur, MBA from IIM, Ahmedabad, Doctorate from the Mumbai Unicersity in a pioneering area (Cybernetic Modeling in Public Systems and a honorary DLit from the Karanatak University, Mysore.
Bail for the well known activists incarcerated in the famed Bhima Koregaon case has been far from easy. After the shocking death of the revered Jesuit and rights activist, Stan Swami in July 2021 (in judicial custody so to speak), advocate Sudha Bharadwaj was granted bail on December 1, 2021. Before that, activist Varavara Rao was granted medical bail.
Related:
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Why Bombay HC rejected pleas of other activists implicated in the Bhima Koregaon case
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Another bullet from Arsenal pierces through NIA’s Bhima Koregaon case!