Sriramulu Srinivas

Cuttack, April 21: Orissa High Court today granted conditional bail to top Maoist leader Sriramulu Srinivas who was arrested from Malkangiri in July 2007 and had since been in jail.

The single judge bench of Justice C.R. Dash granted bail to Srinivas, one of the top seven rebel leaders whose release had been demanded by the abductors of Malkangiri collector R.V. Krishna and engineer Pabitra Majhi, “for a bail amount of Rs 30,000 and two sureties of like amount each”. The court of additional district judge, Malkangiri, will execute the bail.

While allowing Srinivas’ bail petition the high court issued directions to the Maoist leader to leave Orissa within 24 hours of release on bail and prohibited him from entering the Orissa limits without receiving summons from the court.

Sources said Sriramulu Srinivas had been acquitted in six cases. In one case the trial is on while investigation is pending in one more case. He is wanted in three cases in Andhra Pradesh.

The rebel leader was recently on a hunger strike in the Malkangiri jail demanding implementation of the 14-point agreement between the Orissa government and the Maoist-chosen interlocutors, which had paved way for release of the Malkangiri collector.

While Srinivas was granted bail in February by a fast track court in a case, the court of the additional district judge had rejected his plea in another case. Sources said the pending case was related to an attack in Koraput district. Subsequently, he had moved the high court.

It may be mentioned that five other top Maoists, including Ghanti Prasad, had been earlier granted bail by the high court. Prasad had played a major role in negotiations for Krishna’s release. However, the Maoists are sore that the government has not kept its word and has been dragging its feet over the 14-point agreement.