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‘When there was no crime committed, everything had to be fabricated.’ They see it as a war, and everything is fair in love and war’, said Prashant Rahi, who after spending 12 years behind bars in 2007, was acquitted on March 6 along with Prof. G.N. Saibaba.
“No matter how grave a crime, or how big a gangster, they aren’t placed in the anda (egg-shaped) cell in Nagpur Central Prison. In the prison’s 90-year-old history, I think I was the only one who was put there” said Prof. G.N. Saibaba.
For those unfamiliar with his case in entirety might brand him as an Urban Naxalite, but those who knew him personally remember him as a staunch human rights activist, a beloved professor and comrade of the Left. In May 2014, Prof. Saibaba was arrested with five others under the draconian UAPA for alleged association with the banned Communist Party of India (Maoist).
The evidence raised to substantiate the allegations was to be laughed at. Bananas, umbrellas, and newspapers were relied on by the prosecution as items used to identify oneself, along with the presence of Naxalite literature, which was gravely termed “proof of terrorist activity”. They were charged under the UAPA with reference to Section 120-B of the then Indian Penal Code, 1860. After an arduous decade, on 5th March of 2024, the High Court acquitted Saibaba and five others, with the learned bench calling the trial court’s verdict a “failure of justice,” adjudged on the basis of dodgy evidence and lack of technical propriety.
Due to post-operative complications after undergoing gallbladder surgery, he breathed his last on October 12th whist the doctors relentlessly tried to resuscitate his collapsing heart, aged 58. His literary contributions, struggle for people’s liberties, love towards teaching and personal tribulations are numerous and is one example of the many who strive hard for equality and social justice. Their trials and tribulations of justice cannot be contained and conveyed in mere words, as they are to be saluted for.
References:
- G. N. Saibaba – Wikipedia.
- Prashant Rahi: ‘My 7 years in Anda cell were the most inhuman form of solitary confinement’ – Rediff.com India News.
- A stolen life: Remembering GN Saibaba, who the State kept imprisoned over a decade – The News Minute.
- Saibaba Acquittal: From Lack of Sanction to Dodgy Evidence, High Court Judgment Tears Into State’s Case – The Wire.
These pieces are being published as they have been received – they have not been edited/fact-checked by ThePrint.