GUWAHATI: Peasant leader Akhil
Gogoi was sent to judicial custody on Sunday in connection with a case registered with
Dudhnoi Police in September. He was produced before a lower court in Goalpara on Sunday morning, only two days after he was granted bail in a sedition case by a Dibrugarh court.
"The court has sent him to judicial custody today but will take up his bail plea on December 26," informed Krishak Mukti Sangram Samiti (KMSS) leader Bhasco De Saikia, who added that
KMSS activists will be continuing to protest against his rearrest.
Saikia added that Gogoi's rearrest is a part of the government's attempt to keep the firebrand peasant leader behind bars.
"The case in which he was arrested by Goalpara Police did not even have his name mentioned in the
FIR. This proves how the Sarbananda Sonowal-led government is desperate to keep him in jail," he said.
On September 10, Nobajyoti Sharma, the principal of the
Pandit Deen Dayal Upadhaya Model College in
Dudhnoi, filed an FIR with the local police alleging that several members of the Satra Mukti Sangram Samity, KMSS's student wing, had defaced a board in the college. The FIR, however, did not name Akhil Gogoi, instead accusing 'some unknown persons'.
"Even though the FIR did not have Gogoi's name, police arrested him just to delay his release from jail. This is a conspiracy. Being a vocal critic of the BJP-led state government, Gogoi has been protesting the government's handling of the farming crisis, construction of mega dams, land mafia and corruption," Saikia said.
Saikia said the incident in Goalpara was a part of a statewide protest, when the KMSS and its student wing were protesting the government's decision to name 12 new colleges in Assam after Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh ideologue Deendayal Upadhyaya. However, he added, neither was Gogoi in Dudhnoi when the incident in question happened nor has he been named in the FIR. Gogoi has been behind bars since September 18 after being arrested on charges of sedition for making an allegedly provocative speech at a public rally.
