Three days ago, the Bombay High Court heard the bail application of poet and activist Varavara Rao on medical grounds. He was taken into custody exactly two years back this time for his alleged role in the Elgar Parishad case. Since, then, Rao, an octogenarian who suffers from life-threatening comorbidities, continued to serve his time in jail despite the fact that trial in the case has not even begun yet. His bail applications have been dismissed and no reprieve has been provided on medical grounds either.
Recently, Rao tested positive for COVID-19 and as per senior advocate Indira Jaising, who appeared on behalf of Rao before a bench of justices S.S. Shinde and Madhav Jamdar, “Ultimately, the man is on his deathbed and needs some treatment. Can the state say no?”
Rao is completely bed-ridden, in diapers with no medical attendant and has a catheter which has not been changed for three months as there is no one to change it, Jaising argued.
“His family has been kept in dark about his health. No health reports from any hospital have been shared with them after 30 July.”
Rao’s continuous arrest after being charged under the draconian UAPA (Unlawful Activities Prevention Act) has come under sharp focus. In July this year, Twitterati were outraged when Rao’s family complained of negligence on the part of JJ hospital authorities, saying that they allegedly found Rao lying in a pool of urine, with the bedsheets unchanged.
At present, Rao has been shifted from Taloja jail to Nanavati hospital for medical examination and observation, after his health began deteriorating rapidly. However, no interim bail has been granted yet.
His bail applications have been continuously dismissed—the NIA, after taking over the case in January 2020, challenged his pleas stating that he has been accused of serious offences, taking undue advantage of his age and of the prevailing COVID-19 situation and insisted that Rao was stable and was under the best medical care. In the meantime, Rao had fallen unconscious, tested COVID-19 positive and has suffered serious metabolic and mental imbalances.
His sixth and latest bail application was listed before the High Court in mid-September, but nothing happened. When his wife, Hemlata Rao, approached the Supreme Court a month after, the apex court chose to not deliberate but to direct the High Court to do so. Finally, a week ago, the High Court ordered a virtual medical examination by doctors from Nanavati Hospital.
On November 17, the state submitted a report which stated that Varavara Rao was “fully conscious, alert and oriented”. The doctors, however, stated that his catheter had not been changed for three months. It was only when Jaising mentioned that Rao had neither been examined by a neurologist for his dementia nor by an urologist for his urinary tract infection that the High Court sent him to Nanavati for a two-week medical examination.
Rao is a poet and writer who was first arrested for his revolutionary writings, and soon became an accused in the infamous Secunderabad Conspiracy Case which spanned 15 years from 1974-1989. His tryst with prison has been an unending saga as he has spent a considerable time behind bars.
However, at present, the argument is that his present arrest under the Elgar Parishad Conspiracy is undermining his constitutional right to life and is taking away his human right to dignity. “If he does not live and survive for the trial, what will the state have to say,” asked Jaising while arguing in favour of Rao.
It is his opinions that are found to be inciteful and provoking, and are often in support of Maoists. In an interview, he supported Maoists killing the Greyhounds—a special police force unit which specialises in anti-insurgency operations against Naxalites and Maoists. “You put your hand in an anthill, won’t they bite? You snakes are trying to occupy an anthill, won’t they retaliate? Maoists killed the police as part of the people’s war,” he had said, in an interview.
Rao has been sympathetic to the Maoists’ cause since 1973, and this has led him to be charged by the state under the UAPA. Senior bureaucrat Arun Bothra had tweeted, “If there is an opportunity, Varavara Rao will not think twice before rejoicing and justifying killing of or any person who doesn’t agree with the Maoists. That’s the real him. Not the old, frail, and innocent poet as you’re made to believe.”
