NEW DELHI: A Delhi court on Monday sent former Jawaharlal Nehru University student Umar Khalid, arrested in connection with a case related to the widespread violence which broke out in the capital’s northeast area this February, to 10 days police custody “considering the nature of the case”.
Delhi Police’s Special Cell arrested Khalid on Sunday night under the stringent Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act after questioning him for over ten hours. He was produced before Additional Sessions Judge Amitabh Rawat of Karkardooma court via video-conferencing on Monday afternoon.
The Additional Sessions Judge said: “Considering the nature of the case and role of the accused Umar Khalid that has surfaced so far regarding the conspiracy and involvement in anti-CAA/NPR/NRC protest... I deem it fit that, for having an effective and proper investigation, to allow the present application for seeking police custody remand of the accused Umar Khalid for a period of ten days.”
The court has directed the investigating officer to get the accused medically examined every 24 hours. Khalid’s lawyers — Trideep Pais, Sanya Kumar and Rakshanda Deka — have also been permitted to confer with the accused for a period not exceeding half an hour at the beginning of the police custody and thereafter, every day during the remand period.
During the course of proceedings on Monday, Special Public Prosecutor Amit Prasad sought 10 days police custody of Khalid to confront him with huge technical data running into 11 lakh pages, “as well as other evidence collected during investigation of present case and also to examine at length about other suspects and various other aspects.”
‘Criminals like him should be hanged’
Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Kapil Mishra congratulated the Delhi Police for arresting Umar Khalid and said, it is conducting a ‘good and fair investigation’ into the North East communal riots. Reacting to Umar’s arrest, Mishra in a video said, “I congratulate Delhi Police on the arrest of Umar Khalid. Khalid, Safoora Zargar, Tahir Hussain, Khalid Saifi all planned for a massacre in the national capital.”
“It was a terror attack like 26/11 in Delhi. They planned it for a month and spread violence,” he further added. Mishra also called Khalid, a ‘terrorist’ and said, that he has “complete belief that these terrorists like Khalid and Tahir Hussain should be punished with life imprisonment, hanged to death, then only justice will be delivered to the people of Delhi.”
With agency inputs