Bengaluru: The Karnataka High Court on Tuesday granted bail to three persons accused in the murder of activist-journalist Gauri Lankesh, who was shot dead in 2017.
A bench headed by Justice S Vishwajit Shetty granted conditional bail to Amit Digwekar, KT Naveen Kumar and Suresh HL. The accused had been lodged in jail for the last six years in connection with the Gauri Lankesh murder case. The bench opined that they cannot be kept in jail for a long time as the trial of the case is not yet over.
Senior advocates Arun Shyam, Madhukar Deshpande and Basavaraja Sappannavar argued on behalf of the accused. They had applied for bail citing the case of co-accused Mohan Nayak, who was granted bail in December 2023 on the grounds of an undue delay in the trial process and concluded that it may not be completed soon.
During the hearing last year, Nayak, who was the first accused to get bail, was asked to furnish a Rs 1 lakh personal bond with two sureties and appear before the trial court at the hearings. The court had also mentioned that he would not tamper or threaten witnesses. It was stated that only 90 of the 527 chargesheet witnesses had been examined till then.
Lankesh was shot dead by two bike-borne men outside her house in Rajarajeshwari Nagar area in West Bengaluru on September 5, 2017. She was a critic of the right-wing Hindutva politics.
The accused are Amol Kale, Parashuram Waghmore, Ganesh Miskin, Amit Baad, Amit Degwekar, Bharat Kurane, Suresh HL, Rajesh Bangera, Sudhanva Khudekar, Sharad Kalaskar, Mohan Naik, Vasudev Suryavanshi, Sujith Kumar, Manohar Edav, Vikas Patil, Srikanth Patil Naveen Kumar and Hrishikesh Deodikar.
Amol Kale was accused of being the main conspirator while Parashuram Waghmore was accused of firing and Ganesh Miskin of helping him escape by a bike.
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