The Free Saibaba Coalition, US, condemns the recent arrest of five activists, including G.N. Saibaba’s lawyer Surendra Gadling, by the Pune police in the Bhima Koregaon case. These arrests are, like G.N. Saibaba’s case, part of a larger assault on dissent and democratic rights by the Indian government. The Indian government is designating any form of criticism or dissent as a terrorist act, using draconian legislation like the UAPA (Unlawful Activities Prevention Act) to subject activists and progressive people to long jail sentences. These actions by the Indian government, and their long-time efforts to suppress democratic rights and dissent, have led to widespread condemnation within India and, recently, international attention as well. Two members of the European Union Parliament recently signed an open letter to the president of the Parliament, condemning the arrests and the government’s treatment of Professor Saibaba, and calling for the EU Parliament to refuse to allow the Indian Minister of External Affairs, Sushma Swaraj, to participate in a Yoga Day event held by the EU parliament. The five activists were arrested June 6. The police have changed their story many times about what they are accused of. Initially, the police charged them with “masterminding” a violent confrontation which took place at a Dalit event in Bhima Koregaon on January 1st. Later, the police changed the story, saying that they had recovered a letter which showed that the activists were involved in “waging war against the government”, the same vague charge which led to Saibaba’s life sentence. They are accused of plotting to assassinate Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, and of encouraging the violence at Bhima Koregaon as part of a “Maoist plot”. The violence that occurred at Bhima Koregaon, located on the outskirts of Pune, erupted during a Dalit memorial gathering. Bhima Koregaon is the site of an 1818 battle between a Dalit Mahar regiment of the East India Company and an upper-caste force, comprised of soldiers from the Peshwa caste, who were fighting for the Maratha confederacy against the British. The smaller group of Mahar soldiers defeated the Peshwa soldiers, and the battle is commemorated by Dalit activists annually as a symbol of victory against an upper-caste oppressor. This year, Dalit activists organized a gathering, called Elgar Parishad, which took place in Pune on December 31st, 2017, the night before an annual memorial march at Bhima Koregaon. The march itself was violently attacked by right-wing Hindu groups, and one person was killed. The two Hindutva (Hindu nationalist) groups which attacked the march were the Shiv Pratisthan Hindustan, led by Sambhaji Bhide, and the Hindu Ekta Aghadi, led by Milind Ekbote. The police initially arrested Ekbote in connection with the violence, but they quickly dropped the case against him. They then started accusing the organizers of the Elgar Parishad gathering of causing the violence, by “precipitating enmity” between social groups. The police in India frequently protect and support far-right Hindutva groups. In this case, the arrest of the Hindutva leader in connection with the march was a mere formality, and the police almost immediately starting working to dismiss the case against the forces who committed the violence and instead accuse those affiliated with the victims of the violence. This finally culminated in the arrest, on June 6, of one of the organizers of the Elgar Parishad gathering, and four other individuals connected with anti-displacement, pro-Dalit, and pro-Adivasi organizing. The individuals who were arrested are Sudhir Dhawale, the Dalit organizer of the Elgar Parishad protest; Surendra Gadling, a member of the Indian Association of People’s Lawyers who was representing G.N. Saibaba; Mahesh Raut, an activist for Adivasi causes; Rona Wilson, founder of the Committee for Release of Political Prisoners; and Shoma Sen, a feminist and professor in the English department of Nagpur University. The police initially claimed that the group was involved in a conspiracy to incite violence after the Elgar Parishad gathering, even though Sudhir Dhawale was the only one involved with the event. Then, in court, they produced a letter, which they claimed had been recovered from Rona Wilson’s computer, which tells of a plot to assassinate PM Modi. The police have used the letter to argue that the five are conspiring to “wage war against the government”, and that they can therefore be prosecuted under the terms of the same draconian law which was used to convict Professor Saibaba, the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA). The letter, however, is an unconvincing fake that the police have turned out in an effort to brand the accused as terrorists. The police claim that the letter was written by a member of the Communist Party of India (Maoist), a revolutionary party which is leading a guerrilla war against the government in several parts of the country. The CPI(Maoist) is a banned organization which operates totally underground, and being a member of the organization is totally illegal. Yet, the letter lists the names of several people who are supposedly involved in the organization, and it also includes explicit details about both a planned purchase of weapons and a plan to carry out a “Rajiv Gandhi-style” assassination of PM Modi. This is obviously not how a banned organization, which has to operate in complete secrecy, does things. The poet and activist Varavara Rao, who denounced the letter as a fabrication, said: “You [referring to the media] know the style of communication of Maoists. Even I know because I have participated in peace talks. Will anyone with common sense believe that they have been written by Maoist party? Anyone with little knowledge about revolutionary movements can answer whether the party will write such letters to people living in the mainstream society.” The police’s ham-fisted attempts to fabricate the letter would be funny if the situation weren’t so serious. In India today, any form of dissent, including simply exercising the democratic rights supposedly guaranteed by the Indian constitution, can be branded illegal and lead to being imprisoned, or worse. Cases like G.N. Saibaba’s show this reality, as does the recent high-profile killing of journalist Gauri Lankesh. There are many similarities between the Bhima Koregaon case and G.N. Saibaba’s case, including the use of flimsy, fabricated evidence and the usage of draconian anti-terrorist laws to punish dissent and activism. There is also a direct connection between the cases, since G.N. Saibaba’s lawyer, Surendra Gadling, is one of the accused. The police’s fabricated letter also specifically mentions the India-based Committee for the Defense and Release of G.N. Saibaba, implying that the organization is simply a front organization for the CPI(Maoist). This is a continuation of a technique that the government and right-wing groups have long been using to discredit Saibaba and attack those calling for his release. G.N. Saibaba and all of those accused as part of the Bhima Koregaon group are not members of the CPI(Maoist). The right-wing in India, and the government, consistently brands any form of dissent, whether it be pro-democratic rights, anti-displacement, or Adivasi activism, as affiliated with the Maoists. This makes anyone dissenting an “enemy of the state”, and allows them to attack and imprison anyone who objects to their pro-capitalist, anti-democratic, anti-Muslim, and anti-people plans. Given that G.N. Saibaba’s health problems are growing worse by the day, it is worrying that his lawyer has now been imprisoned. He will now have to switch lawyers, which will certainly delay his appeal and lengthen the amount of time that he has to spend in prison without access to medical care. For this reason, and to oppose the ongoing suppression of democratic rights and freedoms in India, the Free Saibaba Coalition US condemns absolutely the arrest and outrageous accusations against the Bhima Koregaon group. We demand that they, along with G.N. Saibaba, be immediately released, and that the Indian government suspend it’s attacks on the people and on democratic rights and freedoms. Free G.N. Saibaba! Free the Bhima Koregaon group! Stop attacks on democratic rights and freedoms! The Free Saibaba Coalition, US