NIA arrests 83-year-old activist Stan Swamy in Bhima Koregaon case
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The National Investigation Agency on Thursday arrested human rights activist Stan Swamy from Ranchi, Jharkhand, his colleagues said. Swamy, a Jesuit priest has previously been questioned in the Bhima Koregaon case.
Swamy was taken into custody from the Jesuit-run Bagaicha social centre, where he lives. “No warrant was presented,” a colleague on the campus said. “NIA people were rough and arrogant. They said he [Swamy] was accused and a senior officer wants to meet him at the NIA office in Ranchi.” However, it is not clear where the activist was taken.
In a statement released earlier in the day, Swamy said he had recently been interrogated by the central agency for 15 hours over a span of five days – July 27 to July 30 and then on August 6. The investigating officials presented several extracts of information allegedly taken from his computer implicating his connection to “Maoist forces”.
“I told them all these are fabrications stealthily put into my computer and I disowned them,” Swamy said.
The activist added that the thrust of the NIA investigation had nothing to do with the Bhima Koregaon case, in which he has been booked as a “suspected-accused”. His Ranchi home has been raided twice – once on August 28, 2018, and June 12, 2019, in that connection. “But it had everything to do to somehow establish (i) that I am personally linked to extremist leftist forces, (ii) that through me Bagaicha is also relating to some Maoists,” Swamy said. “I denied both these allegations in strongest terms.”
The activist asked why the NIA did not consider interrogating him through video conference, given his age and the ongoing coronavirus pandemic.
“After six weeks of silence, I am being summoned to appear in NIA-office in Mumbai. I have informed them (i) that I fail to understand the need for interrogating me further given the fact I have been subjected to that for 15 hours already, (ii) that I am not in a position to undertake the long journey given my age (83) and the nature of the epidemic ravaging the country. Besides Jharkhand State Govt has given a directive that during the lockdown period elderly persons above the age of 65 may not appear in public, (iii) that if the investigating agency wants to interrogate me further it can be done through video-conference.”
— Stan Swamy
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Man arrested with Rs 2.54-crore heroin in Mumbai
Mumbai (PTI): Police have arrested a man and seized over 500 grams of heroin worth Rs 2.54 crore in the illicit market from him in Mumbai, officials said on Friday.
The police's Anti-Narcotics Cell (ANC) made the drug seizure in Santacruz in the western suburbs. The operation was conducted by the Kandivali unit of the ANC on Thursday as part of a special crackdown against drug trafficking in the area, they said.
Acting on specific inputs, an ANC team conducted a raid in Santacruz (East) and intercepted a man. During a search, the team recovered 508 grams of high-grade heroin from his possession, an official said.
The seized contraband, a highly addictive, opioid drug derived from morphine, is estimated to be worth Rs 2.54 crore in the international market, he informed.
Following the seizure, a case was registered against the man under relevant sections of the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act, 1985, and he was formally placed under arrest in the early hours of Friday.
The police are currently investigating the source of the drug and trying to identify the intended recipients of the consignment, he said.
