HYDERABAD: The family members of Telugu revolutionary poet Varavara Rao have moved the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) seeking a direction to the Mumbai hospital, where he is being treated for COVID-19, and prison authorities to provide "transparent" updates on his health status.

Rao is an accused in the Maoist links-Elgar Parishad case.

The petition filed on Friday stated that the family was compelled to approach the rights body as they were denied any information about his condition or his treatment at Nanavati Hospital, Mumbai.

From the time he was shifted out of Taloja Jail to St Georges hospital and then to Nanavati hospital, the only official information provided to the family was that he had tested positive for the COVID-19, they said.

Denial of any information on Rao's health is a direct violation of NHRC's July 13 order, whereby it had specifically directed the prison authorities to provide all the necessary medical care and assistance to the poet with intimation to his family members, they added.

Seeking NHRC's intervention, the family sought official updates on his health and line of treatment every six hours.

Rao, 80, was undergoing treatment in Mumbai hospitals since July 16 after being tested for coronavirus positive.

Rao and nine other activists have been arrested in the Elgar Parishad-Maoist links case, which was initially probed by the Pune Police and later transferred to the NIA in January this year.

Meanwile, as many as 520 Telugu poets, writers and artists had urged Chief Justice of India Sharad Arvind Bobde, Chief Justice of the Maharashtra High Court Dipankar Datta and the State’s Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray to ensure the release of jailed Rao and Delhi University professor GN Saibaba.