Health deteriorated after arrest, says Stan Swamy; seeks bail

MUMBAI: Activist Stan Swamy, an accused in the Elgar Parishad case who has been in Navi Mumbai’s Taloja jail for eight months, told the Bombay high court on Friday that his health had deteriorated rapidly after his arrest and that he would rather “suffer and possibly die” than get hospitalised in Mumbai.

The 84-year-old told a bench of justices SJ Kathawalla and SP Tavade that his health was severely affected after his arrest on October 2020, and the previous two bouts of hospitalisation in Mumbai had not helped improve his condition. Instead, he said he wished to go back to his home town Ranchi on bail.

“The main issue is that eight months ago I could take a bath by myself; I could take a walk; I could do some writing by myself.

But all of these are disappearing...,” the Jesuit priest said.

The bench asked if Swamy would prefer to get “general treatment” at the state-run JJ Hospital, to which the 84-yearold responded that he didn’t think admission to the medical facility would do him any good.

“What medicines will the JJ Hospital give me? I have been there twice. I know the set-up. I don’t want to go there,” Swamy said. “I would rather suffer and possibly die,” he said, insisting that he be granted interim bail.

The court, however, said it was hearing arguments on the issue of hospital admission, and not on bail, in Friday’s hearing.

Swamy is among the prominent activists arrested in the case related to the violence that erupted in Maharashtra’s Bhima Koregaon village in January 2018. He has been booked under the stringent UAPA.