Mumbai: The Bombay high court on Friday, January 23, granted bail to cultural activists Sagar Gorkhe and Ramesh Gaichor, arrested in connection with the 2018 Elgar Parishad case. Both Gorkhe and Gaichor were arrested on September 2, 2020, and have suffered incarceration ever since.A division bench of Justices A.S. Gadkari and S.C. Chandak granted bail on the applications filed appealing against the February 2022 order of the special NIA court in Mumbai.Gorkhe and Gaichor are among the 16 persons who were arrested at different points in the infamous Elgar Parishad case. Of the 16, Jharkhand- based Jesuit priest and activist Father Stan Swamy died in custody in 2021. Swamy was 84 at the time of his death.With their release order, only human rights defender Surendra Gadling will continue to remain in jail from among the arrested 16. Gadling was among the first to be arrested, in June 2018, and has since remained in jail.Two others, tribal rights activist Mahesh Raut and cultural activist Jyoti Jagtap, are out on interim bails.Hany Babu, an academic teaching at Delhi University was granted bail only last month.The detailed bail order is yet to be made available by the court. Both Gorkhe and Gaichor were represented by senior lawyer Mihir Desai.The duo will have to pay bail bonds of Rs 1 lakh with surety each and visit the NIA’s Mumbai office on the first Monday of every month.Also read: Top Investigating Officer Admits Elgar Parishad Event ‘Had No Role’ in Bhima Koregaon ViolenceAlthough named as an accused in the FIR, Gorkhe and Gaichor were arrested two years after the others. Both have been associated with the Kabir Kala Manch, a cultural group involved in anti-caste campaigns in Maharashtra. In 2011, however, the then Congress- led government accused the organisation of being a front for the banned Naxal movement in the state. Ever since, any association with Kabir Kala Manch has been looked at as illegal by the law enforcement. Both Gorkhe and Gaichor have faced incarceration in the past and an earlier case is pending against them.In the Elgar Parishad case, earlier handled by the local Pune police and later taken over by the NIA, the two along with others have been accused of being “urban Naxals”.While rejecting their bail, the special NIA court had accepted the NIA’s claims of the alleged role of the accused in the Elgar Parishad event and their links to banned organisations. They face charges under the stringent Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act.The Bharatiya Janata Party government at the Union has received criticism globally for unjustly arresting human rights defenders and keeping them under prolonged incarceration.Although the NIA has filed a chargesheet in the case, the trial is yet to begin – in yet another example of how UAPA cases advance in this country. Due process, invariably, has meant punishment in such cases. The NIA is also yet to hand over electronic evidence, which it has claimed is key, to the accused persons. Charges are yet to be framed.