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The Bombay High Court judgment was set aside by the SC where the High Court had refused to grant additional time beyond 90 days under the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act for filing the charge sheet against lawyer Surendra Gadling and four other activists arrested in Bhima Koregaon case.
Since June 2018 on allegation where it was suspected that there were Maoist links with Lawyer Surendra Gadling, and activists Shoma Sen, Rona Wilson, Sudhir Dhavale and Mahesh Raut are under custody. The police claim that they have unearthed this during their investigation of Bhima-Koregaon case.
CJI Ranjan Gogoi allowed the appeal of Maharashtra Government, to restore the order of Pune trial court, which granted additional 90 days time to the police to file chargesheet. Clarification was made by the SC that the observations which were made in the judgement will not be effecting the right of the petitioners to seek regular bail.
The main back bone contention raised was whether a proper competent authority has filed chargesheet for the application under Section 43D UAPA for extension of time. It was found by the Bombay High Court that instead of prosecutor the application was filed by investigation officer and the court held that it could not have been acted upon by the trial court.
Appearing for Maharashtra government in the SC, Senior Advocate Mukul Rohatgi submitted that the application bore the signature of the prosecutor as well, and was valid under Section 43D of UAPA. Senior Advocates Kapil Sibal and Dr.A M Singvi appearing for the petitioners had argued that the application cannot be treated as one filed by the prosecutor, merely on the basis of a signature. The application lacked application of mind by the prosecutor, they had contended. The 5000 page chargesheet filed by the police alleged that the arrested activists were part of a Maoist conspiracy plot to assassinate Prime Minister Modi and had planned to to procure arms and ammunition to wage a war against the country.
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