Pendyala Varavara Rao (born 3 November 1940) is an Indian activist, poet, teacher, and writer from Telangana, India.
[4] Rao initially taught Telugu literature at two different private colleges in Telangana, before joining the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting of the Government of India as a publication assistant.
[8] Rao, along with a group of Telugu writers, periodically self-published stories, poems, and other literature, and sold them directly to book sellers.
[6] His poetry collections are: Chali Negallu (Camp Fires, 1968), Jeevanaadi (Pulse, 1970), Ooregimpu (Procession, 1973), Swechcha (Freedom, 1978), Samudram (Sea, 1983), Bhavishyathu Chitrapatam (Portrait of the Future, 1986), Muktakantam (Free Throat, 1990), Aa Rojulu (Those Days, 1998), Unnadedo Unnattu (As it is, 2000), Dagdhamauthunna Bagdad (Burning Bagdad, 2003), Mounam Oka Yuddhaneram (Silence is a War Crime, 2003), Antassootram (Undercurrent, 2006), Telangana Veeragatha (Legend of Telangana, 2007), Palapitta Paata (Song of Palapitta, 2007) and Beejabhoomi (Field of Seeds, 2014).
[4] In 1967, Rao formed part of a generation of writers and poets that criticized the Telugu literary community's disengagement with politics.
[4] The group was inspired by the Naxalbari uprising[7] and the Other members of Virasam included author Kutumba Rao, dramatist Rachakonda Viswanatha Sastri, poet and historian K.V.
[11] Rao was initially arrested in 1973 by the Andhra Pradesh State Government, under the Maintenance of Internal Security Act, on charges of inciting violence through his writing.
[4] Although he was released by an order of the Andhra Pradesh High Court, which rebuked the State Government for failing to show that his writings had resulted in actual violence, he was rearrested in 1975, during the Emergency, under the same law.
Though all the prisoners were released on the day when Emergency was lifted, Varavara Rao was arrested again at the entrance of the jail and was kept behind the bars for a week more on a fresh MISA warrant.
[citation needed] Varavara Rao was at the forefront in mobilising popular and democratic support to the widespread mass movements in northern Telangana during post-emergency days.
[citation needed] In 1985, Rao was one of 46 persons accused of attempting to overthrow the Andhra Pradesh Government in the Secunderabad Conspiracy Case.
Rao was also one of those arrested in the Ramnagar conspiracy case, and accused of attending a meeting in which there was a plan made to assassinate two police officials.
[citation needed] In May 1990, Rao spoke at an event organised by the Andhra Pradesh Raitu Coolie Sanghama labourers' political party which holds an annual conference for laborers and peasants in Hyderabad.
[12] In 2001, the Telugu Desam government in Andhra Pradesh accepted a proposal to have peace negotiations with members of two banned organisations, Communist Party of India (Maoist) and People's War.
[citation needed] Varavara Rao, along with a number of organisations stood in the forefront in exposing and resisting the pro-globalisation and liberalisation policies of Chandrababu Naidu who came to power in 1994.
During Chandrababu Naidu's government, three Central Committee members of Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist) Peoples War were arrested in Bangalore and killed.
Some private criminal gangs killed T. Purushotham and Md Azam Ali, leaders of APCLC and life-threat to Varavara Rao turned imminent.
[citation needed] In 2010, police ordered the arrest of Rao on the basis of a speech that he made at a convention in Delhi, concerning the state of Kashmir.
[4] A First Information Report filed concerning that event alleged that on the 200th anniversary of the battle of Bhima-Koregaon, a program called the Elgaar Parishad had been organised in which leftist groups and Naxalites had participated.
[23] In June 2020, Rao applied again for bail, on the grounds that he was highly vulnerable to Covid-19, and following a government recommendation that elderly inmates and those with co-morbidities should be released from jail in light of the Covid-19 pandemic, but were unsuccessful.
[24] His application for bail was supported by fourteen Members of Parliament, who wrote a letter to Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray, raising concerns about his health as well as jail conditions during the Covid-19 pandemic in India.
[26] Following reports that Rao had been injured again while in the care of the hospital, resulting in a head injury,[27] the National Human Rights Commission ordered that he be moved to a private facility for medical treatment.
[30][31] Rao and others currently face charges under the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act, and attempts to bail Rao out, on grounds of his failing health, finally came to fruition as the Bombay High Court granted him a six-month bail on medical grounds and disapproved the stand of the National Investigation Agency (NIA) in February 2022.