An Alipore court on Tuesday granted unconditional bail to scientist Partha Sarathi Roy, who had been arrested on April 8 for his alleged role in protesting against the eviction of encroachers at Nonadanga, behind Ruby hospital.

Roy, a molecular biologist from the Indian Institute of Science Education and Research (IISER), Mohanpur, led a protest rally by a group of ousted squatters from Nonadanga on April 4 on the EM Bypass and attacked policemen who tried to disperse the rally, according to cops.

Although not arrested on April 4, he and 68 others were arrested from the Ruby crossing after they staged a sit-in demonstration beside the Bypass.

Sixty-one people were released later but Roy and six others were charged with stringent sections.

The IPC sections levelled against him include 143 (unlawful assembly), 149 (offence committed in prosecution of common object during an unlawful assembly), 332 (voluntarily causing hurt to deter a public servant from his duty), 341 (wrongful restraint), 342 (wrongful confinement) and 353 (assaulting a public servant to deter him from discharge of his duty).

Advocate Milon Mukherjee submitted in court that Roy was purely an academic person and that he had been falsely implicated in the case.

“He was on the IISER campus in Kalyani on April 4 and returned to Calcutta only the following afternoon. Then how could he have beaten up the police and attended a protest rally on April 4?” Mukherjee said.

The judge rejected the bail pleas of the six others.