‘Half a decade of arrest, meet time cut to 10 mins’

Nagpur: A post on Tushar Kanti Bhattacharya’s Facebook page has a picture of his wife Shoma Sen, with the lines below reading: Five years of incarceration. Another post has pictures of her along with co-accused Surendra Gadling, Sudhir Dhawale, Rona Wilson and Mahesh Raut. The lines read ‘Repeal UAPA: Behind bars five years and no charges framed, no bail’. A couple of likes can be seen in response.On June 6, 2018, Nagpur University professor Sen was arrested from her home, around the same time a lawyer and activist was also held in the Bhima Koregaon case. The trial hasn’t begun and neither has bail been granted. For a month now, even the time allotted to meet her in jail has been reduced to 10 minutes from 20 minutes, says Bhattacharya. He has pinned hopes on a court hearing scheduled on June 19. The arguments in a discharge petition filed in the NIA court are over and an order is expected. In the meantime, a separate bail petition filed in the Supreme Court will be heard on July 13. An affidavit has been filed in the Supreme Court about her health condition, citing how it has deteriorated after the arrest, says Bhattacharya.The affidavit has her medical reports before arrest. It has been pointed out that she is suffering from hypertension and glaucoma, he says.“Earlier, they used to allow jail meetings for 20 minutes. However, the rules changed probably due to some incident inside and only 10 minutes were allowed for the meeting,” says Bhattacharya. “Post-Covid the jail has not allowed sending her medicines for glaucoma. Instead, we remit money but the purchases are irregular, which is affecting the treatment,” he says.In her discharge petition, the lawyer has argued that no case stands against her as Sen’s arrest was on the basis of electronic devices seized from Rona Wilson’s premises. A private forensic agency has submitted a report that the evidence was planted, said Bhattacharya.In a similar refrain, Minal Gadling, wife of Surendra Gadling, says, “It’s been five years and each year we hope that he would return. We hope that finally he is released.”There are 16 accused in the case, of whom Stan Swamy has died in custody, while three persons; Anand Teltumde, Shubha Bhardwaj and Varavara Rao, have got bail.