Bombay High Court Refuses To Allow Bhima Koregaon Accused Dr Anand Teltumbde To Travel Abroad For Delivering Lectures

After the Bombay High Court on Wednesday expressed disinclination to permit rights' activist Dr Anand Teltumbde to travel to Amsterdam and the United Kingdom for attending academic assignments, the accused in the Elgar Parishad - Bhima Koregaon case, withdrew his plea.

A division bench of Justices Ajay Gadkari and Ranjitsinha Bhonsale while expressing it's view against permitting Teltumbde, asked him to consider delivering lectures virtually.

"Either give virtual lectures or don't go," Justice Gadkari remarked at the outset, while noting the objections raised by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) to Teltumbde's plea.

However, senior advocate Mihir Desai urged the judges to consider the fact that his client will not be merely delivering lectures but would be conducting seminars at various universities.

Special counsel Chintan Shah representing the NIA pointed out that the agency apprehends that Teltumbde may abscond and thus he should not be permitted.

Noting the same, Justice Gadkari told Desai, "Now the attending circumstance is that the discharge application has been rejected (by the special NIA court) and thus there is this apprehension. We are not inclined."

With the bench not convinced, Desai requested the judges to permit him to withdraw his plea and accordingly the same was allowed.

Notably, Teltumbde had approached the High Court after being invited by the University of Amsterdam, Nottingham Trent University among others. His plea stated that he sought to travel to Amsterdam on April 1 and then to UK on May 1 and then would have returned to Mumbai on May 21.

According to his plea, the Faculty of Humanities University of Amsterdam had selected him as a visiting scholar based on his "internationally renowned scholarship and expertise in the area of social justice". It was a four-week programme involving giving seminars, delivering a lecture on Dr BR Ambedkar on April 14, conducting master classes with Ph.D. candidates, post-graduate teachings and meetings with individual scholars and faculty.

Further he was also invited by the Leiden Institute for Asia Studies, Leiden University in the Netherlands to deliver a lecture on April 16. He was also invited by Nottingham Trent University in the United Kingdom as Scholar-in-Residence for the first two weeks in May 2025 to take part in their academic programme and to meet with researchers and doctoral candidates to advise them on their research projects. Thereafter he was invited by Oxford South Asia Society, University of Oxford, University School of Social and Political Science, University of Edinburgh and the University College, London for delivering lectures.

With regards to this, the NIA had stated that though Teltumbde's books may have received international acclaim from foreign countries including the Netherlands and the United Kingdom, however, it was a matter of scrutiny and needed to be verified from the Competent Authority if there was a necessity for Teltumbde to deliver lectures from April 14 to May 15, 2025.

"It may also be considered the thatalleged necessity of the applicant to deliver said lecture in-person is not at all required, as alternatively the said lectures could also be delivered through online mode, with a link to be shared with the NIA, for monitoring his activities. Further, for delivering alleged lectures in-person at the said foreign universities by applicant is strongly opposed on the ground of likelihood of him absconding and thereby allegedly taking shelter in the said countries to avoid the judicial process and trial of this case, as well applicant furthering the criminal and unlawful of CPI (M) in India," the NIA had said.