Activist Teesta Setalvad on Saturday evening walked out of an Ahmedabad jail, where she had been in custody for over two months, PTI reported.
Earlier on Saturday, a sessions court in the city signed the release order for Setalvad, according to Live Law. On Friday, the Supreme Court had granted interim bail to the activist who has been accused of forgery and fabrication of evidence in a case related to the 2002 Gujarat riots.
Setalvad had moved the Supreme Court objecting to a long gap between the date of hearings in the Gujarat High Court. It had issued notice on Setalvad’s bail plea on August 2 but listed the matter for hearing on September 19.
On Friday, a three-judge bench headed by Chief Justice of India UU Lalit said the High Court should have considered her application for interim bail during pendency of the matter as custodial interrogation in the case had been completed.
The forgery case
Gujarat Police had arrested Setalvad on June 26, two days after the Supreme Court had dismissed allegations of a “larger conspiracy” levelled by Zakia Jafri, wife of former Congress MP Ehsan Jafri, against Prime Minister Narendra Modi and other senior Gujarat officials in the 2002 Gujarat riots case.
In an affidavit filed on July 15, Gujarat Police had claimed that Setalvad took part in a conspiracy to destabilise the state government after the 2002 riots. The police had claimed that the conspiracy had been planned at the behest of former Congress MP Ahmed Patel, who died in 2020.
The Gujarat Police alleged that Setalvad “used the guise of collecting money in the name of riot victims” and used a Foreign Contribution Regulation Act licence to obtain funding from various international non-government organisations, to push forward her agenda against the Gujarat government.
The activist is the founder of Citizens for Justice and Peace organisation that helps riot victims get justice.
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