MUMBAI: A special National Investigation Agency (NIA) court on Friday rejected a plea made by Elgar Parishad case accused, Sudha Bharadwaj (58), seeking expunging and withdrawal of certain “scurrilous” statements made by the NIA in response to her plea seeking unredacted statements of a few witnesses.
An unredacted statement refers to a statement that has not been truncated or where certain sensitive and confidential portions are not obscured. Bharadwaj’s plea said the NIA in its reply on December 21, 2020 had alleged that through the application, she was digging into the identities of the witnesses to cause them harm.
The NIA, however, said it was well within the provisions of law to express apprehension that there might be threat to witnesses. Bharadwaj had moved the plea in December. “The applicant is an undertrial prisoner with the presumption of innocence in her favour and there is absolutely no proof that she would cause harm to witnesses. On the contrary, she has spent over 20 years in service of the people,” Bharadwaj’s plea said.
It added that the prosecution cannot be allowed to level defamatory and scurrilous allegations against her merely because she is accused of a crime. “As officers of the court, the prosecution has a responsibility to act with fairness and cannot run roughshod over a vulnerable and incarcerated person by indulging in scandalous mudslinging,” the plea added.