A National Investigation Agency (NIA) court on Saturday sent three artistes — Sagar Gorkhe, Ramesh Gaichor and Jyoti Jagtap — to judicial custody till October 3 in connection with the Bhima-Koregaon violence case. The artistes belonged to a Pune-based cultural group Kabir Kala Manch (KKM)
Mr. Gorkhe, 32 and Mr. Gaichor, 38, were arrested on September 7 and Ms. Jagtap, 32, was arrested from Kondhwa the next day. With this, the count of those in jail in connection with the case has gone up to 15. The trio were also allowed to carry some books to read and write.
Previously, special public prosecutor Prakash Shetty had appeared for the NIA and sought Ms. Jagtap’s remand on the ground that she was named in the original FIR of January 8, 2018, and since then, the police had been searching for her. He had said, “deep-rooted conspiracy” and “serious offences having a severe social impact” are found to be committed by her “along with the other accused”.
While remanding Ms. Jagtap to police custody, special judge R.R. Bhosale had recorded, “The FIR was originally lodged and thereafter various accused persons were arrested and investigation was conducted. As noticed, serious offences having severe impact on society are under investigation since a long period. In this situation, Ms. Jagtap certainly requires to be interrogated in line of the earlier progress of investigation. Prima facie, sufficient material is evident against her for grant of custody.”
KKM is a troupe comprising Dalit and working-class musicians and poets who came together after the Gujarat pogrom of 2002. Their songs became more militant in light of the impunity enjoyed by the perpetrators of the anti-Dalit atrocities at Ramabai Nagar in 1997 and Khairlanji in 2006. Some of these songs feature in the National Award-winning documentary “Jai Bhim Comrade”.
The group is alleged to have links with the banned Communist Party of India (CPI-Maoist). The group had organised the Elgar Parishad event under the ‘Bhima Koregaon Shaurya Din Prerana Abhiyan’ on December 31, 2017. They have been charged under various sections of the Indian Penal Code and the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act.