Bhima Koregaon accused wanted to set up people’s govt: NIA

MUMBAI : 21 people accused of fomenting violence in Maharashtra’s Bhima Koregaon village in 2018 aimed to establish a “people’s government” by overthrowing the government established by law, the National Investigation Agency told a special court.

The NIA, which took over the high-profile probe in January 2020, filed its first chargesheet in October 10, 2020. On August 18, it submitted draft charges to the special NIA court, mentioning 17 charges against 15 arrested and six wanted people in the case.

The accused have been charged under IPC Sections 120-B (conspiracy), 115 (abetment of offence), 121, 121-A (waging war against state), 124-A (sedition), 153-A (arms in procession), 505(1)(B) (statements promoting mischief) and 34 (common intention). They have also been charged under UAPA Sections 13, 16, 17, 18, 18A, 18B, 20 (punishment for terrorist activities), 38, 39 and 40 (punishment for being part of terrorist organisation).

NIA told the court that the 15 arrested and six wanted people were active members of Communist Party of India (Maoist), which is banned under the provisions of the UAPA, 1967, and it’s frontal organisations.

“(They were involved in) organising, collecting and participating in providing funds through the banned terrorist organisation in order to cover the expenses of rebellious activities, and coordinated the Bhima Koregaon programme (held in Pune) with underground Naxalites and exploited the communal sentiments of Dalit and other minority forces and individuals across the state and provoked them in the name of caste in order to create instability and chaos in Maharashtra,” the NIA said in the document. “.... whose main object is to establish janta sarkar or a people’s government via revolution supported by a commitment to protracted armed struggle to undermine and to seize power from the State.”

“In furtherance of the conspiracy, the accused persons... recruited students from various universities, including the Jawaharlal Nehru University as well as the Tata Institute of Social Sciences (whose main campus is in Mumbai) for commission of terrorist activity,” it said.

The NIA further alleged that the accused people also conspired “to organise funding of ₹8 crore for annual supply of M-4 rifles and 4,00,000 rounds and other arms and ammunition through designated supplier from Nepal and Manipur and conspired to overawe the government of India and the state government...”

Currently, 14 people are behind the bars in the case. Violence broke out during the bicentennial celebration of a British-era war in Bhima Koregaon on January 1, 2018 -- at a time hundreds of thousands of Dalit people were attending the event.