What Has Happened A Year After Bhima Koregaon Arrests?
Live LawIt was exactly a year ago that the Pune police arrested five activists for alleged Maoist links in the Bhima-Koregaon case. Surendra Gadling, a Nagpur-based advocate who had taken up cases of several UAPA accused, Sudhir Dhawale, Dalit activist-writer and founder of Republican Panthers, Mahesh Raut, a TISS alumnus working on tribal rights in Gadchiroli, Shoma Sen, a retired professor of Nagpur University and Rona Wilson, a Delhi- based activist working for rights of political prisoners, were arrested on June 6 last year. The police claimed that the investigation into the case unearthed evidence linking the arrested activists to Maoists insurgents, who were plotting to "to assassinate Prime Minister Narendra Modi and to procure arms and ammunition to wage a war against the country". On August 31, the ADG of Maharashtra police held a press briefing, where several letters were flashed to media to suggest that the arrested activists were involved in a plot to assassinate the Prime Minister.