Elgar Parishad case: Court permits activist Teltumbde to visit Karnataka to receive award

A special court here on Tuesday permitted scholar-activist Anand Teltumbde, an accused in the Elgar Parishad-Maoist links case of Maharashtra, to travel to Karnataka for two days to receive an award from the government in the neighbouring state.

Teltumbde, currently out on bail in the seven-year-old case, had filed an application seeking permission to travel to Bengaluru for two days from January 31 to receive the Basava Rashtriya Puraskar Award 2022-23 from the Karnataka government.

Special Judge Rajesh Kataria, assigned to hear matters related to the National Investigation Agency (NIA), allowed the application and directed the accused to inform the central agency about his itinerary and the place where he would be staying in Bengaluru.

The court also directed the academician-activist to attend a hearing in the case trial in Mumbai scheduled on February 2.

On November 18, 2022, the Bombay High Court had granted regular bail to Teltumbde. Later, the Supreme Court decided not to interfere with the HC order after the NIA, probing the case, filed an appeal against the relief granted to the accused.

Teltumbde is among more than a dozen academicians and activists who have been named as accused by the NIA in the case.

The case against Teltumbde and others relates to alleged inflammatory speeches delivered at the Elgar Parishad conclave held at Shaniwarwada in Pune on December 31, 2017, which the police claimed, triggered violence the next day near the Koregaon Bhima war memorial on the outskirts of the western Maharashtra city, around 200km from Mumbai.

The Pune Police, which probed the case before it was transferred to the NIA, claimed the conclave was backed by Maoists.