Prof G N Saibaba is dy­ing in the Taloja prison in Mum­bai. Dur­ing her re­cent visit to Pun­jab, his wife -Vas­anti, who has been his life-long com­pan­ion in thick and thin, told hu­man rights ac­tivists and me­dia, “My hus­band told me that I should not be sur­prised if I re­ceive the news that like Stan Swamy, I have passed away in the four walls of the prison.” Devin­der Pal Singh Bhullar’s wife Navneet Kaur fights back tears while an­nounc­ing protests against the AAP party lead­ers in Pun­jab for ob­struct­ing her hus­band’s re­lease. Maya Kod­nani’s fam­ily and the ex­tended fam­ily of BJP and RSS are elated that though sen­tenced for 28 years, she was able to ob­tain her re­lease in 2 years. Po­lit­i­cal ac­tivist, com­men­ta­tor and for­mer banker Prab­h­dial Singh Saini ex­am­ines the three cases and ex­poses the weak­nesses of the In­dian le­gal sys­tem -clearly veer­ing off to­wards po­lit­i­cally-mo­ti­vated jus­tice.

ALL PLEAS ON LE­GAL, HU­MAN­I­TAR­IAN AND MED­ICAL GROUND FOR PROF. SAIBABA have been dis­missed by an in­hu­mane le­gal sys­tem. He has been con­victed on the ba­sis of a con­fes­sion un­der duress, with the due process thrown to the winds by the ju­di­ciary at all lev­els. He is one of the many other po­lit­i­cal ac­tivists in­car­cer­ated there and who qual­ify to be pris­on­ers of con­science, as they have been im­pris­oned for their po­lit­i­cal views rather than any crim­i­nal ac­tiv­ity ev­i­dence.

Born in a poor peas­ant fam­ily and in­ca­pac­i­tated from waist-down due to po­lio from the age of five, since in prison, he can barely use his hands and limbs and re­quires two or more helpers for his daily per­sonal ac­tiv­i­ties. 

The gutsy Saibaba over­came his dis­abil­ity and be­came a well-re­spected Pro­fes­sor of Eng­lish at the Delhi Uni­ver­sity. Though a very pop­u­lar teacher amongst stu­dents and the fac­ulty, he was dis­missed as a teacher from the Ram Lal Anand Col­lege of Delhi Uni­ver­sity in April 2021.

Ar­rested in May 2014,  he was con­victed for his links with the ex­treme left, un­der “wag­ing war” and “un­law­ful ac­tiv­i­ties.” A staunch re­sis­tance ac­tivist, he par­tic­i­pated in the par­al­lel World So­cial Fo­rum and be­came a part of the In­ter­na­tional League of Peo­ple’s Strug­gle. He was a promi­nent voice in the cam­paign against Op­er­a­tion Green Hunt. 

Though sen­tenced to life im­pris­on­ment in March 2017 un­der Sec­tions 13, 18, 20, 38 and 39 of UAPA and Sec­tion 120-B of the In­dian Pe­nal Code for con­nec­tions with the banned Rev­o­lu­tion­ary De­mo­c­ra­tic Front (RDF), Saibaba de­nied the charges. 

Sig­nif­i­cantly, on 30 April 2020, a panel of ex­perts with the United Na­tions OHCHR called on the In­dian gov­ern­ment urg­ing the au­thor­i­ties to im­me­di­ately re­lease G.N. Saibaba, due to his se­ri­ously de­te­ri­o­rat­ing health. On 28 July 2020, the Bom­bay High Court re­jected Saibaba’s 45-day med­ical bail pe­ti­tion. He was de­nied per­mis­sion to visit his 74-year old mother who died of can­cer, and af­ter she passed away, he was de­nied to par­tic­i­pate in her fu­neral rit­u­als. 

De­fy­ing all logic, deny­ing all rights, ig­nor­ing all pleas, Saibaba and many of his as­so­ci­ates con­tinue to be de­nied bail.

De­fy­ing all logic, deny­ing all rights, ig­nor­ing all pleas, Saibaba and many of his as­so­ci­ates con­tinue to be de­nied bail, though rul­ings of the apex court of the land up­hold bail not jail as a prac­tice for pris­on­ers. All courts seem to have be­come to­tally in­hu­man.

Now move to Dr Maya Kod­nani, who was a min­is­ter in the cab­i­net of Naren­dra Modi, when he was the Chief Min­is­ter of Gu­jarat.  Con­victed for the mur­der of 98 in­no­cent peo­ple, out of which 32 were women and 34 were chil­dren, due to her close prox­im­ity with RSS and the BJP higher-ups.

Dr Maya Kod­nani was a min­is­ter in the cab­i­net of Naren­dra Modi in Gu­jarat, when she was con­victed for the mur­der of 98 in­no­cent peo­ple -32 women, 34 chil­dren and oth­ers male. Sen­tenced to 28 years in prison, she walked free in two years.

Based on the ev­i­dence pro­vided by the Spe­cial In­ves­ti­ga­tion Team, in Au­gust 2012, the court or­dered her to be in­car­cer­ated in prison for 28 years.  

Though con­victed by the court, very soon her first bail for 3 months was granted by the Supreme Court. Fol­lowed by the next one for 6 months..!! Since there was no point in shuf­fling her be­tween home and jail, the gen­er­ous Gu­jarat High Court granted her bail on med­ical grounds and sus­pended her sen­tence in July 2014 barely two years af­ter her con­vic­tion, of which she spent more time out­side jail than in­side the jail!

Is­n’t it the worst form of cru­elty that such a per­son roams free? 

Take the flash­back to Devin­der Pal Singh Bhullar. Wrong­fully ex­tra­dited from Ger­many, con­victed with a 2-1 judge­ment based on con­fes­sion un­der duress in po­lice cus­tody, turn­ing a men­tal wreck while in prison, trans­ferred from Ti­har, Delhi to Am­rit­sar af­ter a pro­longed bat­tle, he con­tin­ues to be in prison even af­ter spend­ing 26 years in prison.  Now, though the gov­ern­ment of In­dia has granted re­mis­sion on the oc­ca­sion of 550 years of Guru Nanak’s birth an­niver­sary, Del­hi’s Ke­jri­wal gov­ern­ment is be­com­ing a hin­drance!

Though the gov­ern­ment of In­dia has granted re­mis­sion on the oc­ca­sion of 550 years of Guru Nanak’s birth an­niver­sary, Del­hi’s Ke­jri­wal gov­ern­ment is be­com­ing a hin­drance in the re­lease of Devin­der Pal Singh Bhullar

The tragedy is such that even quot­ing George Or­well’s “some are equal and some are more equal” sounds cliche.  Is jus­tice pur­blind in this coun­try?  Blind or se­lec­tively blind? Is the ju­di­ciary in­de­pen­dent any­more or is it sub­servient to the Sangh Pari­var in a rather per­ni­cious way? 

The tales do not end with these three. There are many more for whom jus­tice con­tin­ues to be a mi­rage, while pow­er­ful cul­prits get away with mur­der!  

Ham Aah Bhi Bharte Hain Tohn Ho Jaate Hain Bad­nam, Woh Katl Bhi Karte Hain, Tohn Char­cha Nahi Hota -WE take a deep sigh and are de­famed, THEY mur­der with­out a mur­mur!!