5th accused in PFI case, lodged in Kerala jail, fails to appear in court in UP's Mathura

The fifth accused in a case related to the Popular Front of India (PFI), Rauf Sheriff, failed to appear in the court of the additional district and sessions judge here on Friday, the government counsel said.

''Neither he appeared nor any member of the Special Task Force (STF) was present in the court,'' district government counsel Shiv Ram Singh said.

No reason for the non-appearance was submitted in the court by the STF or any other party, he added.

The STF obtained Sheriff's production warrant from the court by moving an application on January 1, stating that he is lodged in a jail in Kerala's Ernakulam.

Sheriff is in jail in a case lodged by the Enforcement Directorate (ED).

Since the warrant was served to the jailor, he was supposed to be presented in the court by the jail authorities, Singh said.

Sheriff, a central leader of the Campus Front of India (CFI), is charged with funding PFI activists Atiqur Rahman, Aalam Masood and journalist Siddique Kappan, who were arrested on October 5 last year for serious offences like sedition, when they were on the way to Hathras in Uttar Pradesh to report on the alleged gangrape and subsequent death of a Dalit woman.