Bombay HC acquits former DU professor GN Saibaba, 4 others in Maoist link case

The Nagpur bench of the Bombay high court on Friday acquitted Maoist sympathiser and former Delhi University professor Gokarakonda Naga Saibaba and his four accomplices from the charges of having links to the banned extremist organisation.

GN Saibaba, has been serving a life term in Nagpur central jail for alleged Maoist links since 2017.

While delivering the judgement, a division bench of the high court also ordered his immediate release from the jail.

The bench, comprising justices Rohit Deo and Anil Pansare, allowed the appeal filed by GN Saibaba challenging a 2017 order of the trial court convicting him and sentencing him to life imprisonment. The bench also allowed the appeal of five other convicts in the case and acquitted them. One of the five died pending hearing of the appeal. The bench directed for the convicts to be released forthwith from jail unless they are accused in any other case.

The Gadchiroli district sessions court convicted Saibaba and five others in 2017 for aiding and abetting Maoist activities and waging a war against the nation. He, along with Mahesh Tirki, Prashant Rahi, Hem Mishra and Pandu Narote, who died at the Nagpur central jail while undergoing treatment a couple of months ago, were awarded lifer under various sections of the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA) along with Section 120 (B) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) for criminal conspiracy.

The wheelchair bound English professor was arrested by the Maharashtra police in May, 2014 for his alleged links with the top leaders of the outlawed CPI (Maoist). He was terminated from his services by DU’s Ram Lal Anand College in August 2021.

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Saibaba came under police scanner after Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) student Hem Mishra, who was arrested in 2013 while he was on his way to Abujhmad in Chhattisgarh, allegedly told police during interrogation that he was acting as a courier between the professor and Maoist leaders, including the then secretary general of the organisation, Puppalla Laxman Rao alias Ganapathy.

He also allegedly told police that Saibaba, whom he had met at his Delhi residence, asked him to pass on some “important” documents to the central leadership of the CPI (Maoist) in Abujmad, near Chhattisgarh-Maharashtra border.

Reacting to the high court judgement, Saibaba’s wife Vasantha GN said that the verdict has vindicated their voice against the State power. “Now it has been established that he (Saibaba) was framed by the state police on flimsy grounds,” she added.