A court docket in India has acquitted a disabled educational and 4 others serving life sentences for allegedly having hyperlinks to Maoist rebels.

GN Saibaba, who’s paralysed from the waist down, was convicted in 2017 for waging an insurgency towards the state.

He has denied all of the allegations towards him.

A court docket in Maharashtra state acquitted him in 2022, however India’s high court docket had suspended the order and requested for a re-hearing.

On Tuesday, the Nagpur bench of the Bombay High Court acquitted Mr Saibaba and others and put aside their life sentences.

A former professor at Delhi University, Mr Saibaba was first arrested in 2014 after he was accused of being a member of the outlawed Communist Party of India (Maoist).

Maoist rebels say they’re preventing for communist rule and rights for tribal individuals and rural poor.

Mr Saibaba had travelled to tribal areas and prominently campaigned towards the actions of the Indian army and a pro-government, anti-Maoist militia.

But he denied any involvement with the Communist Party of India (Maoist).

An area court docket, nonetheless, stated in 2017 that he was responsible of “criminal conspiracy and waging war against the nation”.

In his verdict, the choose stated that “though he is physically handicapped, he is mentally fit”, and that “the imprisonment for life is not a sufficient punishment to the accused”.

In 2022, the Bombay High Court cleared him of all fees however the verdict was challenged by the Maharashtra authorities within the Supreme Court, which then suspended the order.

The court docket stated that the accused had been convicted of a “very serious” crime “against the sovereignty and integrity of the country”, and that the excessive court docket had not handled the information of the case.

Activists and human rights group have criticised the wheelchair-bound activist’s persistent arrest, calling it unjust.

United Nations Special Rapporteur Mary Lawlor had referred to as it an “inhumane and senseless act” that bore “all the hallmarks of a state seeking to silence a critical voice”.