Bhima Koregaon case: Bail application for Vernon Gonsalves, Arun Ferreira, Sudha Bharadwaj to be heard on Oct 26

Pune Sessions Court will pronounce a verdict on bail applications of Vernon Gonsalves, Arun Ferreira and Sudha Bharadwaj on October 26. The three activists are presently under house arrest following the Supreme Court's order in the Bhima Koregaon case.

On October 5, Vernon Gonsalves and Arun Ferreira had filed bail applications in Pune Sessions Court while Sudha Bharadwaj had filed a bail application on October 6. 

Earlier on Wednesday, the Supreme Court rejected an urgent hearing on a review petition filed by historian Romila Thapar against the verdict that refused SIT probe into arrests of five activists in Bhima Koregaon case and allowed the Maharashtra Police to continue with its investigation.

Thapar and four activists had earlier filed a petition in the Supreme Court against the arrests of Left-wing activists in connection with the Bhima Koregaon violence on 1 January and for suspected Maoist links.

Last month, police arrested five left-wing activists, after raiding their homes in several states for suspected Maoist links over the Elgar Parishad meeting which was held a day before the violence.

The police raided the homes of the activists and lawyers from five states - Varavara Rao in Hyderabad, Vernon Gonsalves and Arun Ferreira in Mumbai, Bharadwaj in Faridabad and Gautam Navalakha in Delhi. 

In a media briefing, the police had released details of seized letters related to five activists arrested in June in connection with the Bhima Koregaon violence.

The police also claimed they have "conclusive proof" to link Left-wing activists arrested in June and this week to Maoists, saying one of them spoke of a "Rajiv Gandhi-type event to end Modi-raj".