The Kolhapur circuit bench of the Bombay High Court on Tuesday granted bail to three accused arrested in the 2015 case related to the murder of Communist Party of India (CPI) leader Govind Pansare. A single-judge bench of Justice Shivkumar G Dige granted bail to Virendra Sharadchanda Tawade, Sharad Bhausaheb Kalaskar and Amol Arvind Kale. Dr Megha Pansare, daughter-in-law of the deceased activist, had filed intervention applications opposing their bail pleas. Govind Pansare and his wife were attacked during their morning walk on February 16, 2015, in Kolhapur. While his wife survived the attack, the CPI leader succumbed to his injuries four days later at a Mumbai hospital. The Maharashtra Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS) alleged that the accused were linked to a radical right-wing outfit called Sanatan Sanstha and its affiliated organisations. Tawade and Kalaskar are also named, along with Sachin Andure, as accused in the 2013 murder of rationalist Dr Narendra Dabholkar. Several of those charged in the Pansare case are also implicated in the 2015 killing of scholar M M Kalburgi and the 2017 murder of journalist Gauri Lankesh. In August 2022, the high court transferred the investigation from the Criminal Investigation Department’s (CID’s) Special Investigation Team (SIT) to the Maharashtra ATS. The ATS identified 12 accused, and charges related to murder, attempt to murder, and criminal conspiracy were framed against 10 of them under the provisions of the Indian Penal Code and the Arms Act. On January 2 this year, another bench of the high court held that further monitoring of the probe in the case was not required and directed the Kolhapur sessions court to expedite the trial. The trial court had declared alleged shooters Vinay Pawar and Sarang Akolkar absconding. On January 29 this year, the high court granted bail to six accused in the case, including Andure, Vasudev Suryavanshi, Bharat Kurne, Amit Degvekar, Amit Baddi and Ganesh Miskin, who were arrested in 2018 and 2019. The high court had then observed that they were in jail for five to six years, awaiting conclusion of trial, and they deserved to be released on bail due to “the long period of incarceration”.
