Saibaba was acquitted earlier this month after spending the last decade under incarceration in a case that the High Court described as “failure of justice”.
The first thing one notices about human rights activist and former Delhi University professor GN Saibaba is the dignified strength in his eyes and his voice as he speaks.
Saibaba was released from Nagpur Central Jail on March 7 after seven years of incarceration for allegedly having links to the banned Communist Party of India (Maoist).
He waged an arduous legal struggle for the better part of the last decade, ever since being first arrested in May 2014.
After being convicted in 2017, Saibaba, who is differently abled and uses a wheelchair, underwent a torrid time in prison, denied adequate medical care and dignified living conditions that has left him visibly frail and with a host of medical conditions.
He was placed in a high-security “anda cell” meant for solitary confinement and lost his job as assistant professor at the Delhi University’s Ram Lal Anand College.
Most strikingly, even after being discharged by the Bombay High Court in 2022 for the lack of sufficient grounds for criminal proceedings against him, Saibaba’s release was stayed the very next day by the Supreme Court. Ultimately, another bench of the High Court acquitted him earlier this month.
Scroll met Saibaba and his wife Vasantha Kumari at their residence in Delhi.
This story was originally published in scroll.in. Read the full story here.
