Pune court rejects Anand Teltumbde's pre-arrest bail plea

A court here rejected Friday anticipatory bail application filed by Dalit scholar Anand Teltumbde in the Elgar Parishad-Maoist links case.

Additional sessions judge Kishor Vadane observed that investigating officer has collected sufficient material against Teltumbde.

"In my view, there is sufficient material collected by the investigating officer to show the involvement of the present accused in the alleged commission of the offence," the judge observed.

The investigation was at a crucial stage and custodial interrogation of the accused was necessary, the court held.

The prosecution Thursday had submitted an envelope containing "evidence", claiming that it proves Teltumbde's involvement in Maoist activities.

Teltumbde filed the anticipatory (pre-arrest) bail application before the Pune court after the Supreme Court rejected his plea seeking to quash the FIR against him in the Elgar Parishad case.

Prosecutor Ujjwala Pawar had argued that some of the correspondence seized by police revealed that the leaders of the banned CPI (Maoist) comrade Prakash, Milind (Teltumbde), Surendra Gadling, Rona Wilson, Shoma Sen and Anand Teltumbde were in contact with each other.

"It establishes a larger conspiracy," she had said.

Gadling, Wilson and Sen are already arrested.

According to Pune Police, Maoists had supported the Elgar Parishad conclave held here on December 31, 2017, and the inflammatory speeches there led to violent clashes at the Koregaon Bhima war memorial the next day.