A top ranking Naxal ideologue Vijay Kumar Arya is behind bars for nearly seven years, facing altogether eleven cases but interestingly he is not named as accused in any of them. Of them two cases go back to Andhra Pradesh and in both of them he has been acquitted, one each in Telangana and Punjab and remaining seven cases belong to Bihar.

The CPI (Maoist) Central Committee member Arya was arrested on May 1, 2011 from a village under Barsoi block in Katihar district by the Special Task Force and Bihar Police team and was lodged in Gaya Central jail. “What is shocking that Arya has not been taken on remand in any case till today,” said socio-political activist Shyam Sundar. Arya, 60 something, belongs to Karma village under Konch police station in Gaya district,

had been active in Bihar, Jharkhand, UP and undivided Andhra Pradesh to spread Maoist ideologies.

Sundar alleged that a conspiracy has been hatched to eliminate Arya in the jail. “He is lodged in jail illegally. He is not named in any FIR and arrested only on suspicion. During this long period of incarceration he was not produced in court despite summons,” said Sundar who is son-in-law of Arya. He said the Gaya jail administration wrote several times to district police authorities for providing police escort to produce Arya in a court at Kharar in Punjab.

The Punjab sub-divisional court has issued production warrant to Gaya jail authorities several times. Jail superintendent Rajiv Kumar pleaded helplessness in producing high security inmate due to non provision of police escort. Kumar said he has requested Gaya Senior SP to depute police party to escort Arya to Kharar court in Punjab. Kumar sent a reminder on Saturday last.

Sundar has also written a letter to Chief Minister Nitish Kumar urging his interference in the matter by ordering the police to move fast and produce Arya in Punjab court. He blamed the police for not giving the matter priority and creating a suspicion that “police is hatching conspiracy to kill him.”

 He said Arya due to long incarceration and growing age has developed several diseases and was in a state of utter depression. Arya had also been a political worker with close affinity to lalu Prasad long back.

The supporters of Arya are reportedly planning to move the Patna high court with a habeas corpus urging the judiciary to order his immediate production in response to warrant from a Punjab court.