Student outfits and a section of the Delhi University fraternity condemned the arrest of professor Hany Babu by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) on Tuesday. They said it was “a blatant attempt to silence dissent.”

Hany Babu Musaliyarveettil Tharayil, an associate professor in the Department of English, was arrested in connection with the Bhima Koregaon Elgar Parishad case. The NIA accused him of propagating Naxal activities and Maoist ideology. He was accused of being a “co-conspirator” in the case by the agency.

This is the 12th arrest in the case so far. Earlier, activists and academicians including Gautam Navlakha, Anand Teltumbde and Sudha Bharadwaj were arrested in the case.  

Meanwhile, the Campaign Against State Repression (CASR), a collective with over 36 organisations, issued a public statement demanding the professor’s release.

 “We are particularly appalled to hear of the efforts made by the NIA to pressurise Prof. Babu to implicate himself and others as part of the fabricated Bhima Koregaon-Elgaar Parishad case,” the statement read.  

The news of his arrest was “shocking” said Abha Dev Habib, a professor at Miranda House college.

“He has risen as the voice of marginalised students and is a pro-democracy activist. If you put anyone in jail now (amid the COVID-19 pandemic), it is like giving death sentence. We will continue to protest for his release,” she said.

Nalini, a student of Delhi University’s English Department, said, “Ambedkarite intellectual and anti-caste activist Hany Babu’s arrest is yet another draconian attack on the democratic ethos of India and a blatant attempt to silence dissent by the Modi government. This attack upon intellectuals should alarm all progressive voices in the country.”

“He is a much better person than he is being made out to be. We all know what is happening in the current time and how there has been a witch-hunt of activists,” said a final-year student of English (Hons), requesting anonymity.

The case is related to the Elgar Parishad an event that marked the 200th anniversary of Bhima Koregaon. It was attended by thousands of people and incidents of stone-pelting were reported. In the protest, four were injured and a man was killed. Following this, Maharashtra bandh was called by Dalit groups on 3 January 2018. As the protest intensified, more than 100 protestors were detained by the police.