New Delhi: The human rights group People’s Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL) has condemned the raid conducted by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) at the rented room of a student activist in Uttar Pradesh’s Prayagraj in the early hours of Friday (August 30) in connection with his alleged Naxal links.

A seizure memo of the operation seen by The Wire showed that the raid was regarding a 2023 FIR lodged under charges of criminal conspiracy, waging war against the nation and several sections of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act.

In a statement, the NIA said it conducted multi-state raids – across locations in UP, Delhi, Haryana and Punjab – as parts of its “efforts to scuttle the attempts of the banned CPI [Communist Party of India] (Maoist) organisation to revive its presence in the Northern Regional Bureau area”.

A total of nine locations, linked with various accused and suspects in the 2023 FIR case were searched as part of the crackdown, the NIA said.

The agency raided four locations in Punjab, two each in UP and Haryana, and one in Delhi.

Several digital devices (laptops, mobile phones, pen drives, compact discs, hard drives, compact discs, memory cards), SIM cards and pocket diaries were seized during the searches, conducted at the premises of suspects believed to be close aides of various accused in the instant case, the NIA said.

The agency alleged that “these suspects were receiving funds for propagation of CPI (Maoist)........

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