Supreme Court allows ‘house arrest’ for activist Gautam Navlakha: what this entails | Explained News,The Indian Express
House arrest is allowed under specific conditions that are peculiar to each prisoner. They almost always include restrictions on travel and meeting people, and may include electronic surveillance of the prisoner by means of a wearable tracking device.
Navlakha, 73, is an accused in the Bhima Koregaon case and has been in jail since April 2020. He suffers from multiple ailments. He moved the Supreme Court after the Bombay High Court rejected his plea seeking transfer to house arrest on account of his medical condition.
What did the court say?
A Bench of Justices K M Joseph and Hrishikesh Roy ordered, “He (Navlakha) was placed in house arrest in an earlier occasion… Prima facie, no complaint that he misused earlier house arrest. No criminal antecedents apart from this case against him…We would think that we should allow to be house arrest, at least, to begin with, for a period of one month,” legal websites Live Law and Bar and Bench reported.
The Bench had earlier said in oral remarks: “This Court has considered house arrest as a form of custody… All kinds of restrictions. We will try out. He’s not in the best of health…70 years old man. He’s on his way to the inevitable…Place whatever restrictions. At least let him remain in house arrest for a few days. Let’s try to work it out…”
Setting aside the High Court order, the Bench said, “We are little mystified as to why High Court said petitioner does fulfill criteria of age. He’s aged 70 years. The state of health is also far from perfect, there are multiple health issues…,” Live Law reported.
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