GTA Sabha members Nima Tamang and Prabha Chettri granted bail

GTA Sabha executive members,  Tamang and  Prabha Chettri,  were granted bail by the Darjeeling session’s court Kurseong Additional District & Sessions judge respectively yesterday and released from the Siliguri jail around 10.30pm last night.

GTA member Prabha Chettri
GTA member Prabha Chettri
With the release of Nima Tamang, the number of GTA Sabha members freed from jail has reached four.

Nima Tamang, the GTA member of Homes-Bhalukhop constituency in Kalimpong, returned home past midnight.

“I am happy that I have finally been released but there is a feeling of sadness as well, since many of my colleagues are still in jail,” he said.

Ten GTA members had been arrested during the July-September phase of the Morcha’s agitation for Gorkhaland. Six are still in jail.

The other three GTA members who were released are Prabha Chhetri, the Nari Morcha leader from Kurseong, Morcha vice-president Kalyan Dewan and Morcha assistant secretary Binay Tamang.

Nima Tamang is a leader of the Morcha’s youth wing.

He was granted bail yesterday in the last of the 10 charges slapped on him relating to an attack on Singamari police outpost on July 30.

“He was released from the Siliguri jail around 10.30pm yesterday and arrived here past midnight,” said a Yuva Morcha member.

Today, 150 Morcha supporters marched around town along with Nima Tamang to celebrate his release.

GTA member Prabha Chettri, who had been arrested on August 18 this year, has been granted bail by the Kurseong Additional District & Sessions judge and will be released on Friday.

GTA member Prabha Chettri
GTA member Prabha Chettri
The GTA member from the Mahanadi-Tindharay constituency under Kurseong sub-division had been detained on various charges.

Talking to reporters in the afternoon, Chettri’s lawyers Ashok Sharma, Rajen Thapa and HW Lama said their client had been arrested on charges such as blocking of NH55, disturbing police work, attacking with sharp weapons and arson, among others.

Chettri had already obtained bail on all cases except on the arson one (GR 197/2013, 436 IPC) and the matter was heard today by Judge Tarak Nath Bhagat who subsequently approved her bail upon a payment of Rs3,000 as surety.

The defence counsel said that on June 19, the shop cum house of TMC activist Surat Rai in Latpunchar was torched reportedly under the directive of Chettri. They further informed the bail was granted on the ground of Chettri being a woman with a family to look after. Moreover, no FIR has been filed against her in the arson incident. The counsel trio also noted Chettri’s husband is 65 per cent physically handicapped with no one to take care of him.

Public prosecutor IK Sharma said as Chettri has a disabled husband, there was no opposition to her bail application.


Nine more GTA sabha members, arrested under various charges during the latest phase of the statehood agitation this August, are yet to be released. They include Binay Tamang, Mahendra Pradhan, Arun Singchi, Kalyan Dewan, Nima Tamang, Yogendra Rai, Anosh Thapa, Pranay Thapa and Anit Thapa.

Source- Telegraph and EOI

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