[Bhima Koregaon] Anand Teltumbde challenges UAPA bail provisions before Bombay High Court

Bhima Koregaon accused Anand Teltumbde has approached the Bombay High Court challenging bail provisions of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) and misuse of the term "front organisation" by the National Investigation Agency (NIA)..The Bench of Justices SS Shinde and NJ Jamadar posted the matter for hearing after three weeks..Challenge to use of "front organisations".Teltumbde submitted that the Special Court under the NIA Act had rejected his bail holding that he was a member of banned organisation, Communist Party of India (Maoist). .He has stated that neither the UAPA nor any Rules defined what a front organisation was. He submitted that the only way an organisation could be declared "banned" was after the Central government notified the same or added it under the Schedule of the UAPA. .Teltumbde's contention was that the First Schedule of the UAPA not only included individual organisations, but also all their formations and front organisations. The definition of "front organisation" was very broad and misused by the NIA, the petition stated."The NIA affidavits opposing Petitioner's bail merely state that Petitioner is member of certain organisations however "the manifest arbitrariness is apparent from the fact that the act itself does not define 'front organisations,'" the plea stated. .He also pointed out that NIA's submission was that certain organisations which are fronts for banned organisations were also banned. However, this was not a decision of the Central government but by an individual officer of NIA. "The Special court seems to find nothing wrong with this and appears to have granted its stamp of approval to this. It is important to look at some of these organisations," the plea added. .Challenge to Section 43D of the UAPA pertaining to bail.Teltumbde has stated further that Section 43D of the UAPA creates an insurmountable hurdle for any accused to be granted bail. By virtue of the provision, bail is denied to the accused for many years, at times till the end of the trial, the plea stated..He submitted that even for cases under UAPA, the bail provisions needed to be seen in context of the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC), which did not prescribe any condition concerning the court having to come to a prima facie conclusion about guilt or innocence of the accused while granting bail..Teltumbde contended that the UAPA did not impose any bar on High Courts from exercising powers under Section 439 of the CrPC to grant bail. However, the wording of the Section takes away the judicial discretion of the Court to even superficially examine the case against the accused, the petition stated..Challenge to bail rejection order.Teltumbde also sought quashing of the order of the Special NIA Court rejecting his bail on the following grounds:That chargesheet reads into thousands of pages and NIA admittedly intends to examine more than 200 witnesses; due to this it would take years to complete the trial and that would mean continued incarceration for years. That object of bail is to secure attendance of accused at the trial, bail should not be withheld as a punishment..He also pleaded that if bail is not granted bail, "the minimum that should be done in his case is judicial custody should be in the nature of house arrest".