SC to hear bail plea of activist Jyoti Jagtap on Sept 8 in Elgar Parishad case
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The Supreme Court will on Monday take up the bail plea of activist Jyoti Jagtap, arrested in 2020 in the Elgar Parishad-Maoist links case.
A bench of Justices M M Sundresh and Satish Chandra Sharma is also scheduled to hear a plea by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) challenging the bail granted to activist Mahesh Raut.
Raut was given bail by the Bombay High Court. However, the order was stayed after the NIA sought to move the apex court against the verdict.
In its ruling on Jagtap’s appeal, the Bombay High Court had observed that she was an active member of the Kabir Kala Manch (KKM). The court noted that during a stage play at the Elgar Parishad conclave in Pune on December 31, 2017, the group gave “not only aggressive, but highly provocative slogans.”
“We are of the considered opinion that there are reasonable grounds for believing the allegations or accusations of the NIA against the appellant (Jagtap) having conspired, attempted, advocated and abetted the commission of a terrorist act as prima facie true,” the court said.
According to the NIA, KKM functions as a front organisation of the Communist Party of India (Maoist).
The high court had earlier dismissed Jagtap’s appeal challenging a February 2022 special court order that had denied her bail.
The Elgar Parishad conclave was held at Shaniwarwada, an 18th-century fort in Pune. Jagtap, a singer and activist, was accused of raising provocative slogans and singing at the event along with other KKM members. She was arrested in September 2020 and has been in jail since.
Investigators allege that the speeches delivered at the conclave incited violence at Koregaon-Bhima on January 1, 2018, on the outskirts of Pune.