: Saturday, May 1, 2021, 4:53 PM IST
India cuts a sorry figure in the run-up to the World Press Freedom Day on May 3, writes Anil Singh
Among those booked in recent years under the draconian UAPA and left to rot in jail include civil rights activists, lawyers and academicians in the 2018 Bhima Koregaon-Elgar Parishad case, students arrested in the anti-CAA protests, human rights defenders, RTI activists and even an 83-year-old Jesuit priest, Stan Swamy.
India has been famously described as a land where many centuries co-exist but now, it is also one where many versions of the truth co-exist; somewhat like the six blind men discovering an elephant.
AGRA: Kerala journalist Siddique Kappan was on Friday taken to AIIMS, Delhi from UP’s Mathura jail, two days after the Supreme Court directed the Uttar Pradesh government to transfer him to a better health facility in the national capital.
Senior superintendent of Mathura jail, Shailendra Maitrey, said, “Kappan was taken to AIIMS in an ambulance on Friday morning. A jail doctor and deputy jailor were also with him.”
On Wednesday, the apex court had directed the state government to shift Kappan to Delhi for treatment after his medical reports revealed that he had multiple health issues like diabetes, heart ailment, blood pressure, and bodily injury.
The Supreme Court on Wednesday directed the Uttar Pradesh government to shift jailed journalist Siddique Kappan to any government hospital in Delhi from Mathura for better treatment, days after his wife had written to the Chief Justice of India alleging that her husband had been chained to his bed “like an animal”.
Wednesday’s hearing witnessed sharp exchanges between a bench headed by Chief Justice N.V. Ramana and solicitor-general Tushar Mehta, appearing for the Uttar Pradesh government. While the lawyer cited the hospital bed crisis in Delhi and Uttar Pradesh, the court said it would intervene as it had been informed Kappan was unwell.
NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Wednesday directed the UP government to shift journalist Siddique Kappan, in custody since October 5 for alleged links with the Popular Front of India (PFI) and accused of going to Hathras purportedly to create disharmony in the aftermath of the death of a girl who was gangraped, from Mathura jail to a Delhi hospital for treatment.
This direction was met with disapproval and resistance from UP government, which through solicitor general Tushar Mehta said all hospitals in Delhi were full of Covid patients and admitting Kappan, a 42-year-old non-Covid inmate accused under the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act, to a Delhi hospital would result in asking a Covid patient, who could be a senior citizen, to vacate her bed. “I can’t request any hospital to do such a thing,” the SG said.
SC says right to life embraces even undertrial, orders shifting of Kappan to Delhi for treatment
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SC says right to life embraces even undertrial, orders shifting of Kappan to Delhi for treatmentPTI
Last Updated: Apr 29, 2021, 02:27 PM IST
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Synopsis It would be in the interest of justice to shift Siddique Kappan - the arrestee, either to Ram Manohar Lohia Hospital or to All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) or any other Government Hospital in Delhi for the proper medical treatment. The needful shall in this regard be done at the earliest, the bench said in its order uploaded last Wednesday night.