Rights activist Binayak Sen convicted, arrested

Dec 24, 2010 |

IANS

Raipur

Tags:

Rights activist Binayak Sen, accused of links with Maoists, was Friday convicted for sedition and conspiracy by a Chhattisgarh court and arrested soon after, leaving his family and fellow activists shaken and disappointed.

District and sessions court judge B.P. Varma found Mr Sen guilty on a variety of counts such as under 124 A and 120 B of the Indian Penal Code and also under the Chhattisgarh Special Public Security Act.

Mr Sen, a medical doctor, had been out on bail since in 2009 "I lost my voice, please leave me," his distraught brother Dipankar Sen, in tears, told mediapersons at the court complex.

Kavita Srivastava, the People's Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL) national general secretary, reacted angrily. "This is a fabricated case by the Chattisgarh government and police. It is hard to believe the judgment.

We will go for appeal," she said. Said Rajendra K. Sail, former PUCL President: "It is injustice, totally disappointing. There was no evidence against Mr Sen.

We will appeal." Sen was arrested in 2007 from Bilaspur for alleged links with Maoist ideologue Narayan Sanyal but was released in May 2009 at the behest of the Supreme Court. The case against continued even as Maoist guerrillas stepped up attacks on security forces in Chhattisgarh, killing scores of them.

Post new comment

<form action="/comment/reply/49017" accept-charset="UTF-8" method="post" id="comment-form"> <div><div class="form-item" id="edit-name-wrapper"> <label for="edit-name">Your name: <span class="form-required" title="This field is required.">*</span></label> <input type="text" maxlength="60" name="name" id="edit-name" size="30" value="Reader" class="form-text required" /> </div> <div class="form-item" id="edit-mail-wrapper"> <label for="edit-mail">E-Mail Address: <span class="form-required" title="This field is required.">*</span></label> <input type="text" maxlength="64" name="mail" id="edit-mail" size="30" value="" class="form-text required" /> <div class="description">The content of this field is kept private and will not be shown publicly.</div> </div> <div class="form-item" id="edit-comment-wrapper"> <label for="edit-comment">Comment: <span class="form-required" title="This field is required.">*</span></label> <textarea cols="60" rows="15" name="comment" id="edit-comment" class="form-textarea resizable required"></textarea> </div> <fieldset class=" collapsible collapsed"><legend>Input format</legend><div class="form-item" id="edit-format-1-wrapper"> <label class="option" for="edit-format-1"><input type="radio" id="edit-format-1" name="format" value="1" class="form-radio" /> Filtered HTML</label> <div class="description"><ul class="tips"><li>Web page addresses and e-mail addresses turn into links automatically.</li><li>Allowed HTML tags: <a> <em> <strong> <cite> <code> <ul> <ol> <li> <dl> <dt> <dd></li><li>Lines and paragraphs break automatically.</li></ul></div> </div> <div class="form-item" id="edit-format-2-wrapper"> <label class="option" for="edit-format-2"><input type="radio" id="edit-format-2" name="format" value="2" checked="checked" class="form-radio" /> Full HTML</label> <div class="description"><ul class="tips"><li>Web page addresses and e-mail addresses turn into links automatically.</li><li>Lines and paragraphs break automatically.</li></ul></div> </div> </fieldset> <input type="hidden" name="form_build_id" id="form-db3e341b1841dc601e44867915e682fe" value="form-db3e341b1841dc601e44867915e682fe" /> <input type="hidden" name="form_id" id="edit-comment-form" value="comment_form" /> <fieldset class="captcha"><legend>CAPTCHA</legend><div class="description">This question is for testing whether you are a human visitor and to prevent automated spam submissions.</div><input type="hidden" name="captcha_sid" id="edit-captcha-sid" value="92479369" /> <input type="hidden" name="captcha_response" id="edit-captcha-response" value="NLPCaptcha" /> <div class="form-item"> <div id="nlpcaptcha_ajax_api_container"><script type="text/javascript"> var NLPOptions = {key:'c4823cf77a2526b0fba265e2af75c1b5'};</script><script type="text/javascript" src="http://call.nlpcaptcha.in/js/captcha.js" ></script></div> </div> </fieldset> <span class="btn-left"><span class="btn-right"><input type="submit" name="op" id="edit-submit" value="Save" class="form-submit" /></span></span> </div></form>