The Maharashtra Police had arrested five activists — Varavara Rao, Arun Ferreira, Vernon Gonsalves, Sudha Bharadwaj and Gautam Navlakha –for alleged Maoist links in the aftermath of violence that occurred at Bhima Koregaon near Pune last year.

The Maharashtra government Thursday moved the Supreme Court challenging the Bombay High Court order that set aside a Pune court order granting an extension of 90 days for investigation into the alleged Maoist links of five arrested activists by the state police.  The apex court will hear the matter on October 26.

A bench headed by Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi considered the submissions of lawyer Nishant Katneshwar, appearing for the Maharashtra government, and acknowledged that the appeal needed to be heard on an urgent basis, PTI reported.

Appearing before the court, Katneshwar said if the Bombay High Court order is not stayed, then the accused in the case would become entitled for grant of statutory bail for want of non-filing of chargesheet within the stipulated period.

Earlier, the Supreme Court refused to interfere with the arrest of activists and declined the demand of appointing a SIT to investigate the matter.

The Maharashtra Police had arrested five activists — Varavara Rao, Arun Ferreira, Vernon Gonsalves, Sudha Bharadwaj and Gautam Navlakha –for alleged Maoist links in the aftermath of violence that occurred at Bhima Koregaon near Pune last year.

(Inputs from PTI)