Prof. Saibaba shares prison days

The wheelchair-bound professor from Delhi University GN Saibaba, who was arrested on May 9, 2014 for alleged Maoist links and was released recently, shared his arduous time in prison, interacting with people at Lamakaan in Banjara Hills.

On May 24, Saibaba along with the President of Revolution of Democratic Front, Varavara Rao and others were scheduled to speak at a public meeting in Warangal, but were prevented to do so due to a High Court order.

“When I was taken forcibly and arrested two years back, the first thing the police officer told me was to shut up. They didn’t want me to speak. It is disappointing that after two years when I have come here, I am hearing the same thing. I was depressed with the court decision for preventing me to talk with the public at Warangal,” lamented Prof. Saibaba.

“For the first three days I was not given any food, water and toilet facilities in jail. It took them nine months to set up a small western toilet inside my cell and till date it does not work. The jail authorities lied to the court that I was given all facilities,” he revealed.

He expressed that the 85 per cent of prisoners in the Nagpur Central Jail are Adivasis, in which most were booked under petty crimes.

“The entire jail was like a concentration cell. They did constant raids in my cell and they would take away anything they found suspicious. I was not allowed to write a sentence in Telugu even as part of a letter to my family members,” he said.

Interacting with people at Lamakaan, he said the book titled ‘Dreams in a Time of War- a Childhood Memoir’; which he translated into Telugu as ‘Yuddakalamlo Swapnalu- Balya Gnapakaalu’ while he was in Nagpur jail, written by Kenyan writer Ngugi wa Thiongo.

Varavara Rao, President of Revolution of Democratic Front expressed, “A physically challenged person with 90 per cent disabilities should not be arrested as per international laws. These days media and judiciary have became more corrupt because of the corporatisation.”