Slain IPS officer''s wife opposes bail for Binayak Sen in HC

Bilaspur, Jan 25 (PTI) The wife of an IPS officer, who waskilled in an encounter with Maoists in Chhattisgarh, todayfiled a petition in the state High Court seeking denial ofbail to rights activist Binayak Sen during hearing of his casechallenging life imprisonment for sedition.

Ranjana, wife of the slain Rajnandgaon Superintendent ofPolice Vinod Kumar Choubey, submitted in her interventionpetition that her husband was killed while fighting Naxals andthat if 61-year-old Sen along with another convict Piyush Guhawas granted bail, it could lead to more such attacks.

A division bench comprising justices T P Sharma and R LJhanwar observed that Ranjana could put forward her contentionthrough the prosecution. Later, hearing on Sen''s case wasadjourned till February nine.

The hearing in the case was witnessed by eight EuropeanUnion observers who were allowed by the High Court yesterdayto attend the proceedings.

Appearing for Sen, a PUCL activist, for the second day,his lawyers Mahendra Dubey and Surendra Singh told the courtthat the evidence produced by the prosecution against hisclient in the trial court was based on hearsay and that suchmaterial could not be entertained under law.

They contended that Sen''s meetings with his co-convict andNaxalite ideologue Narayan Sanyal in jail were in connectionwith activities of People''s Union of Civil Liberties and thatthey were held always under the vigil of jail guards.

Moreover, Sen, a doctor by profession, was bodily searchedeach time he visited the jail and no incriminating documentwas found from him during the frisking, the lawyers said.

Noted lawyer and BJP MP Ram Jethmalani had appeared for Senyesterday, but he was not present in court today.

Sen, along with Sanyal and Guha, a Kolkata businessmen,were sentenced by a sessions court on December 24 last to lifeimprisonment for colluding with Maoists to establish a networkto fight the state.

Jethmalani had yesterday told the High Court, "My clientis absolutely innocent. There is no case....The whole case isnothing but political persecution and legally it is a case ofno evidence, not merely bad evidence, but no evidence."

Besides some PUCL activists, Sen''s wife Ilina and twodaughters also attended the proceedings.

Dubey, who also represented Guha, told the court that hisclient did not know who Sen or Sanyal were and had never metthem. Therefore, accusing him of sedition was not right, hesaid.