Gujarat court sentences MLA Jignesh Mevani to 6 months jail in 2016 case

Ahmedabad Metro Police Court on Friday sentenced Gujarat Congress working president and MLA Jignesh Mevani and 18 others to 6-month imprisonment following a 2016 case.

Mevani, along with other Dalit rights groups had held a protest in 2016 regarding the change of name of the law building of Gujarat University. They demanded the building be named after Dr BR Ambedkar.

However, Appellate Sessions Court has stayed the sentence till October 17 to enable them to file appeals and granted bail to the accused. The court granted bail to all 19 persons.

Notably, Jignesh Mevani is currently out on bail granted by the Assam court. He was arrested in connection with his purported tweets against Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Mevani was arrested by an Assam police team from Palanpur town in Gujarat over a couple of his tweets.

In May this year, a Gujarat court sentenced Mevani to three months in jail in a 2017 case for taking out a rally without permission.

Vadgam MLA Jignesh Mevani, Reshma Patel, Kaushik Parmar of National Dalit Adhikar Manch, Kaushik Parmar, Subodh Parmar including 10 others were sentenced to three months imprisonment and a fine of Rs 1000.

Mevani and his associates led an 'Azadi Kooch' from Mehsana to Dhanera of the neighbouring Banaskantha district in 2017. In 2017, the Mehsana police registered an unlawful assembly case against Mevani and others under Section 143 of the Indian Penal Code.

The Assam state Congress unit had protested the arrest of the Gujarat legislator. Elected as an independent MLA, Mevani extended his support to Congress in September 2019.