The Supreme Court (SC) on Friday refused to entertain a plea by activist and poet P Varavara Rao, an accused in the 2018 Bhima Koregaon violence in Maharashtra, seeking modification of his bail condition. Rao has sought modification of the condition which required him to seek prior permission from the trial court if he wished to leave the Greater Mumbai area. A bench of Justices JK Maheshwari and Vijay Bishnoi expressed disinclination to grant modification and the matter was dismissed as withdrawn. “Government will take care of his health or go to the same court. We are not interested,” the bench said.
Senior advocate Anand Grover, appearing for Rao, submitted that the activist has been out on bail for four years but his health is deteriorating. Grover stated that Rao’s wife used to take care of him earlier but she has shifted to Hyderabad. He said there is no one to look after him at present and the trial is also not likely to be completed anytime soon. The top court on August 10, 2022 granted bail to Rao on medical grounds.The SC ordered Rao not to leave the jurisdiction of Mumbai “without express permission of the trial court”. The Telugu poet was arrested on 28 August, 2018, from his home in Hyderabad and was an under-trial in the Bhima Koregaon case in which an FIR was lodged by the Pune Police at Vishrambagh Police Station on January 8, 2018, under various sections of IPC and several provisions of the UAPA.
