Elgar case: HC extends Varavara Rao's surrender deadline till Feb 28

The Bombay high court on Friday extended till February 28 the time granted to poet-activist Varavara Rao to surrender in the Elgar Parishad-Maoist links case.

Rao (83), an accused in the case, was granted temporary bail for health reasons by the high court in February 2021.

He was to surrender on September 5, but filed a plea seeking an extension of the bail and later filed another application seeking permanent bail on the ground of ill-health.

Since then, the high court has extended the time given to him for surrendering before the Taloja prison authorities in Navi Mumbai several times on various grounds.

As per the last order, Rao was to surrender on February 5.

His bail applications were mentioned by the lawyers for urgent hearing on Friday before a bench of Justices S S Shinde and N R Borkar.

The bench then deferred the deadline for surrender to February 28, 2022.

Rao's bail applications are likely to be heard in coming weeks.

The case, now being handled by the National Investigation Agency, relates to 'Elgar Parishad', a conclave held in Pune on December 31, 2017, which according to Pune police was funded by the Maoists.

The inflammatory speeches made there led to violence at the Koregaon-Bhima war memorial the next day, the police had alleged.