The Bombay High Court’s decision to exonerate former Delhi University Professor G N Saibaba in a Maoist connections case was overturned by the Supreme Court on Wednesday. The high court will now have four months to reconsider the case’s merits.
In the matter before the Supreme Court, prominent counsel R Basant defended Saibaba while attorney Abhikalp Pratap Singh represented the Maharashtra government.
What was said by the SC?
a top court bench The judges M R Shah and CT Ravikumar gave the chief justice of the Bombay High Court the order to have the case considered by a different bench and to not bring Saibaba’s appeal and the appeals of the other defendants before the same bench that had released them.
The Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) sanctions and other legal issues are to be left up to the high court for decision, according to the statement. The Bombay High Court’s decision to exonerate Saibaba and other defendants in the case was postponed by the Supreme Court on October 15.
The Bombay High Court issued a statement.
The Bombay High Court cleared Saibaba of all charges on October 14 of last year, more than eight years after his detention in 2014, and ordered his release from custody, stating that the sanction order given to prosecute the accused in the case under the strict terms of the UAPA was “bad in law and invalid.”
Saibaba’s appeal against a 2017 trial court ruling convicting and sentencing him to life in prison for violations of the UAPA and the Indian Penal Code was accepted by the high court’s Nagpur bench.
Apart from Saibaba, the Bombay high court had freed farmers Mahesh Kariman Tirki, Pandu Pora Narote, Hem Keshavdatta Mishra, and journalists Prashant Sanglikar, who had received life sentences, and labour Vijay Tirki, who had received a 10-year term. While the appeal was pending, Narote passed away.
