Court grants bail to SFI activists at Sanskrit varsity

Account subscription benefits alongside Premium Stories, Editorials, Opinions and more. Unlock these with Subscription

The Perumbavoor Judicial First Class Magistrate Court on Wednesday granted bail to the four Students’ Federation of India (SFI) activists who were arrested in connection with a protest at Sree Sankaracharya University of Sanskrit (SSUS), Kalady, on August 13, during which an alleged symbolic funeral of Vice-Chancellor (V-C) Ciza Thomas was staged.

Those who were granted bail included Mebin Jose, 24, member of the SFI’s State committee; Basil Scaria, 29, Vijeesh, 23, and Yadhu Krishnan, 19. They were booked under the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita Sections 189(2) (unlawful assembly), 191(2) (rioting), 126(2) (wrongful restraint), 115(2) (voluntarily causing hurt), 121(1) (voluntarily causes grievous hurt), 127(2) (wrongful confinement), 74 (assault or use of criminal force against women), and 132 (assault or criminal force to deter a public servant from discharging their duty).

Two separate cases were registered in connection with the incident. The first case was registered on August 13 based on a complaint by a police officer deployed on the campus during the protest, while the second FIR was registered on August 16 following a complaint by Ms. Thomas.

P.S. Sanjeev, SFI State secretary, alleged that the activists were granted bail as the case was fabricated. He asked Home Minister Ramesh Chennithala and Higher Education Minister Roji M. John what they had to say on the bail granted to the SFI activists. They should apologise to the students for making false allegations, he said in a social media post.

Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. They cannot be abusive or personal. Please abide by our community guidelines for posting your comments.

We have migrated to a new commenting platform. If you are already a registered user of The Hindu and logged in, you may continue to engage with our articles. If you do not have an account please register and login to post comments. Users can access their older comments by logging into their accounts on Vuukle.