Poet, journalist get bail in sedition case

KOPPAL: Poet Siraj Bisaralli and journalist Rajabaxi, who were booked in a sedition case and surrendered to the court on Tuesday, were granted bail on Wednesday.
General secretary of the BJP’s Gangavathi city unit, Shivakumar Ambalayya Arakeri, lodged a complaint against the two persons on January 24 with Gangavathi rural police.
He had lashed out at Bisaralli for criticising legislation passed by the government at an event funded and organised by the state. Arakeri charged Rajabaxi, an editor of an online portal, with uploading videos of the event on YouTube and other websites.
Bisaralli, an employee with a private television channel, pointed out that he had been invited to participate at the cultural fete held in Koppal in January in recognition of his literary merits. “I have penned two anthologies of poetry. Yes, when I recited the poem in question, a few political workers expressed their opposition to it, but I have never faced such a situation. Rajabaxi and I have been trying to get bail from January 28. Since we were unable to get bail, we decided to surrender on Tuesday,” he told TOI.
The principal JMFC court in Gangavathi on Tuesday gave police custody of the duo till Wednesday afternoon.
The cases filed against the duo outraged members of a few citizen groups, and more than 50 lawyers from Gangavathi, Koppal, Ballari and Bengaluru filed applications expressing interest to argue their case.
Meanwhile, a police officer said they were unlikely to seek extended custody of the duo, not unless fresh evidence surfaced.