RTI activist Akhil Gogoi remanded to 14-day judicial custody; court rejects NIA’s appeal to extend period by 10 days

Guwahati: RTI activist and farmer leader Akhil Gogoi, who was arrested under the stringent UAPA amidst the widespread protests in Assam over the Citizenship Amendment Act, was on Thursday sent to judicial custody for 14 days by a special NIA court in Guwahati. The court turned down the plea of the National Investigation Agency (NIA) seeking his custody for 10 more days, Gogoi’s counsel Santanu Borthakur told PTI. He said that the court pulled up the NIA for taking Gogoi, who is the chief adviser of the Krishak Mukti Sangram Samiti, to Delhi without intimating it when he was in the custody of the anti-terror agency. Gogoi will be produced before the NIA court again on 10 January, Borthakur said. [caption id=“attachment_859011” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] KMSS general secretary Akhil Gogoi. Facebook[/caption] Gogoi was instrumental in mobilising protests across several districts in upper Assam against the contentious law. He was arrested by the state police in Jorhat on 12 December when the protests over the amended Citizenship Act were rocking Assam. He was later handed over to the National Investigation Agency (NIA), which booked him under various sections of Indian Penal Code and the stringent Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act. Gogoi was sent to the central agency’s custody for 10 days on 17 December and was produced at the special NIA court on Thursday after bringing him from Delhi in the morning. On 17 December, the court had directed the NIA to ensure regular medical checkup of Gogoi and allow his family members and lawyers to meet him. The NIA on Thursday searched the peasant leader’s residence at Nizarapara area of Guwahati and seized several documents, files on KMSS, copies of its registration certificate, a laptop, and copies of his PAN card, an SBI debit card, an electoral photo identity card (EPIC) and a bank passbook, his wife Gitashree Tamuly said. “They also took away the handwritten manuscript of a book that he was writing. It is on his experiences inside jail,” she said adding the NIA also seized Gogoi’s research on NHPC. The KMSS office in Gandhibasti area of the city too was raided and some books and leaflets were seized, its president Raju Bora said. The Congress, All Assam Students’ Union (AASU) and Asom Jatiyatabadi Yuva Chhatra Parishad (AJYCP) and the general people have been demanding immediate release of Gogoi. When the firebrand leader was being taken to the NIA court on 17 December, he had told waiting journalists that he has been subjected to “extreme torture”. “The agitation must not stop. I appeal to the people to continue the protests until the law(CAA) is repealed,” Gogoi had said as security personnel rushed him to the courtroom with his hands handcuffed.