NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Friday adjourned till 22 September, Monday, the bail pleas of Sharjeel Imam, Umar Khalid and seven others who are challenging the Delhi High Court order rejecting their bail in the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) case linked to the alleged larger conspiracy behind the 2020 north-east Delhi riots.
During a brief hearing on Friday, the lawyer for one of the accused sought deferment of the hearing of the bail plea. The two-judge bench of the apex court, headed by Justice Aravind Kumar and Justice N V Anjaria, allowed the request.
The top court bench thus fixed the bail pleas of Imam, Khalid and seven others — Mohd Saleem Khan, Shifa Ur Rehman, Athar Khan, Meeran Haider, Shadab Ahmed, Abdul Khalid Saifi and Gulfisha Fatima — for hearing on 22 September, Monday.
On 6 September, former JNU student Imam moved the Supreme Court after the Delhi High Court rejected his bail plea. He sought bail in the alleged larger conspiracy case under the UAPA in relation to the 2020 north-east Delhi riots case.
Similarly, the former JNU student Khalid had, on 10 September, Wednesday, approached the Supreme Court challenging the Delhi High Court’s order rejecting his bail under the UAPA case related to the alleged criminal conspiracy behind the February 2020 riots in the national capital.
According to the prosecution, the Delhi Police had booked Imam under the stringent UAPA. On 28 January 2020, he was arrested by the Delhi Police’s Crime Branch from Bihar’s Jehanabad in a sedition case for allegedly making inflammatory speeches at Jamia Millia Islamia University and Aligarh Muslim University.
The riots took place in February 2020 following clashes over the then-proposed Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA). As per the Delhi Police, the riots caused the death of 53 persons and injured hundreds.
The prosecution has alleged that Imam had hatched a larger criminal conspiracy to cause multiple riots. The FIR in this case was registered by the Special Cell of the Delhi Police under various provisions of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and the UAPA.
Imam has been booked in multiple FIRs across several states, mostly under sedition and UAPA charges. Besides Delhi, Imam is facing FIRs in the states of Uttar Pradesh, Assam, Manipur and Arunachal Pradesh.
Imam was granted bail by the Delhi High Court last year for his alleged speeches at Jamia Millia Islamia University and Aligarh Muslim University. In the sedition cases registered in Aligarh and Guwahati, he was granted bail by the Allahabad High Court in 2021 and the Gauhati High Court in 2020 respectively. He was also booked in FIRs in Arunachal Pradesh and Manipur.
On 2 September, the Delhi High Court rejected the bail pleas of nine persons, including Khalid and Imam, in the case, saying “conspiratorial” violence under the garb of demonstrations or protests by citizens could not be allowed.
The High Court, which had rejected the other accused’s bail pleas, included Mohd Saleem Khan, Shifa Ur Rehman, Athar Khan, Meeran Haider, Abdul Khalid Saifi, Gulfisha Fatima and Shadab Ahmed.
The social activist and former JNU student Khalid has been in jail since his arrest by the Delhi Police on 14 September 2020 for his alleged involvement in the Delhi riots case. He was booked under the stringent UAPA for his alleged larger conspiracy behind the Delhi riots case. He has denied the charges and claimed innocence in the case.
Khalid had earlier approached the top court challenging an October 2022 Delhi High Court verdict that had denied him bail. Since then, he has been in jail and has never been granted bail, despite his best efforts and filing constant appeals across courts pleading to be released on bail.
He had initially, in the Delhi High Court, sought bail on the grounds that he neither had any “criminal role” in the violence in the city’s north-east area nor any “conspiratorial connect” with any other accused in the case. The Delhi Police had opposed Khalid’s bail plea in the High Court.
The police had also arrested Imam, activist Khalid Saifi, JNU students Natasha Narwal and Devangana Kalita, Jamia Coordination Committee member Safoora Zargar, former AAP Councillor Tahir Hussain and several others under the stringent law in the case.
According to the prosecution, the violence had erupted following protests against the CAA and NRC. The protests had allegedly left 53 people dead and over 700 injured.
Khalid was charge-sheeted in the case along with other accused persons.