Activists Ferreira, Gonsalves gets police custody remand till November 6

PUNE: The court of special judge K D Wadane on Saturday sent activists Arun Ferreria and Vernon Gonsalves in police custody remand till November 6 in the Elgar Parishad case.
Activist Sudha Bharadwaj will be produced before the court for seeking a custodial remand in the evening.

Ferreria and Gonsalves were brought to the district and sessions court, Pune amid tight security around 9.15am. The arguments of the prosecution and defence lawyers for seeking their custodial remand commenced at 10.15am.

On September 28, the Supreme Court had extended the house arrest of these activists by four weeks which ended on Friday. The police action came after the Pune court rejected their bail plea. The police took them into custody and brought them to Pune.

District government pleader Ujjwala Pawar told the court that the activists were arrested after investigations revealed that they had allegedly recruited new members for the banned Communist Party of India (Maoist). Their custodial interrogation was essential for establishing the identity of the members.

She submitted that the interrogation of the activists was essential for finding out the objectives and policies of the CPI, responsibilities assigned to them and establishing their individual role in the crime. The prosecution pleaded to sent the activists in police custody remand for 14 days on the grounds that they were involved in a serious crime.

Opposing the prosecutions plea, defence lawyers Siddharth Patil and Rahul Deshmukh pleaded before the court to sent them in judicial custody remand on the grounds that nothing incriminating was recovered from the activists after they were arrested on August 28 and later placed under house arrest as per the apex court order.

The court after hearing both sides sent the activists in police custody remand for 10 days.