HYDERABAD: Telugu revolutionary poet Varavara Rao's two sons-in-law have been issued notices by the NIA on Monday to appear before the investigative agency. Rao has been arrested in connection with the Elgar Parishad event that took place in Pune and having alleged Maoists link.

K Satyanarayana who is a professor at the city-based English and Foreign Languages University (EFLU), and the other son-in-law, a journalist with an English business daily, said they received the notices sent by the National Investigation Agency, Mumbai, asking them to appear before it as a witness on September 9.

Satyanarayana said in a statement that he has no connection with the case. "It is a fact that I am related to Varavara Rao but I reiterate that I have no connection with the case," Satyanarayana said in a statement. "NIA notice adds to our family distress at a time when Varavara Rao's health condition is not very good and the (COVID-19) pandemic is fast spreading in Mumbai. I was summoned to Mumbai in these terrible times," he said.

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.

The case relates to alleged inflammatory speeches made at the Elgar Parishad conclave held in Pune on December 31, 2017, which the police claimed triggered violence the next day near the Koregaon-Bhima war memorial.

Pune police claimed that the organisers of the event had alleged Maoists links.