Who is Varavara Rao and why is NIA urging Bombay HC to dismiss his permanent medical bail plea?

Rao was arrested in November 2018 for alleged links with Naxals and for allegedly making provocative speeches.

New Delhi: The National Investigation Agency (NIA) on Monday (March 21, 2022) urged the Bombay High Court to dismiss the permanent medical bail plea filed by Varavara Rao, an accused in the Elgar Parishad Maoist links case. 

The NIA said that charges against Rao were "very, very serious," and, if proven, could attract the death penalty.

Varavara Rao is a poet-activist from Telangana. The 83-year-old had completed his post-graduate degree in Telugu literature from Osmania University and had then taught Telugu literature at private colleges in Telangana. He later joined the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting of the Government of India as a publication assistant and retired from teaching in the late 1990s.

Rao was arrested in November 2018 for alleged links with Naxals and for allegedly making provocative speeches on December 31, 2017, that police claimed incited the violence at Bhima Koregaon village in Pune district the next day. On January 1, 2018, the violence had left one dead and several others injured including 10 policemen.

Additional Solicitor General Anil Singh, who appeared for NIA, told HC that Varavara Rao seemed to be suffering from "regular old age-related issues," and the probe agency was willing to give an undertaking that requisite medical aid would be provided to him in prison or in a government hospital whenever required.