India’s Supreme Court has granted interim bail to a Christian educator, who was arrested in December on a slew of complaints including attempts to murder and violating an anti-conversion law.
A three-judge bench headed by Chief Justice D Y Chandrachud, on March 4 ordered the release of Rajendra Bihari Lal, vice-chancellor of the Sam Higginbottom University of Agriculture, Technology and Sciences (SHAUTS).
The British-era institution was established in 1910 and is based in Prayagraj, formerly Allahabad, in northern Indian Uttar Pradesh state.
The state police arrested Lal on Dec. 31, 2023, following a complaint from Diwakar Nath Tripathi, a local leader of the pro-Hindu Bharatiya Janata Party, which runs the state government.
Earlier, Lal’s bail pleas were turned down by a local court and the state high court.
“We direct by way of an ad interim order that the petitioner be released on interim bail,” the Supreme Court order said.
Police have registered several cases against Lal under the state’s strident anti-conversion law that criminalizes religious conversion without prior sanction from the government.
In the latest case registered in Naini police station in Prayagraj district, Lal is accused of attempting to kill the complainant, Tripathi.
Tripathi’s complaint said two men who accompanied Lal in a vehicle opened fire at him while he was returning home after a morning walk.
“It is a baseless and fabricated case,” a close ally of Lal told UCA News on March 5.