New Delhi: The Campaign Against State Repression (CASR) has strongly condemned the continued imprisonment of Advocate Kripa Shanker Singh and activist Binda Sona Singh, who have now spent exactly two years in Uttar Pradesh jails without trial in a case the organisation has described as “wrongful incarceration” based on alleged “Maoist links”.

The two were arrested on 5 March 2024 by the Uttar Pradesh Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS) in simultaneous raids on their homes and linked to a 2019 case. Advocate Kripa Shanker Singh, a practicing lawyer at the Allahabad High Court, has regularly represented political prisoners and members of marginalised communities. Binda Sona Singh, a former school teacher who now works as a private legal typist, has been actively involved in democratic rights and civil liberties campaigns. According to CASR, their arrests form part of a wider pattern in Uttar Pradesh where lawyers, activists and civil liberties defenders are routinely implicated in sweeping “Maoist links” cases, often on the basis of possession of literature or electronic material, without any transparent disclosure of specific evidence of unlawful activity.

Conditions inside prison have severely affected the health of both detainees. Advocate Kripa Shanker Singh has been kept in a sensitive/segregated barrack amounting to semi-solitary confinement, which has led to acute psychological distress including hallucinations. He has also developed hydrocele, for which jail doctors themselves have recommended surgery, yet no urgent medical intervention has been arranged despite repeated court applications. Binda Sona Singh has been suffering persistent gynaecological complications and has had to rely on medicines arranged from outside the jail. Recently she fell inside the prison premises and suffered a severe leg sprain, yet was still forced to attend court proceedings while limping.

Their bail applications have been pending before the Allahabad High Court for more than a year. Although dates are regularly listed, the cases have repeatedly not been taken up for hearing; the latest such adjournment occurred on 19 February. CASR has pointed out that such prolonged delays turn pre-trial detention into de facto punishment, violating the principle that bail and not jail should be the norm.

Describing the two-year incarceration without conviction as “punishment through process”, CASR has demanded the immediate and unconditional release of both Advocate Kripa Shanker Singh and Binda Sona Singh, urgent independent medical treatment outside jail, expedited hearing of their pending bail pleas on merits, and an immediate end to the targeting of democratic activists under vague “Maoist links” allegations in Uttar Pradesh. The organisation has warned that the continued detention of a practicing lawyer whose professional duty is to defend constitutional rights sends a chilling message to the entire legal fraternity and democratic movements across the country.