Delhi Riots: Court Reserves Order On Bail Plea Of Ex-JNU Student Leader Umar Khalid

A Delhi Court on Thursday reserved the order on the bail plea of Umar Khalid, an accused in the Northeast Delhi violence case.

Former JNU student leader Umar Khalid was arrested on September 13, 2020.

The Delhi Court today reserved the order on bail plea of Mr Khalid in Northeast Delhi violence case registered under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act.

The Court will pronounce the order on March 14, 2022.

Additional Sessions Judge Amitabh Rawat reserved the order after hearing the submissions of the special public prosecutor (SPP) and Senior Advocate Tridip Pais, Counsel appeared on behalf of accused Umar Khalid.

The Court also reserved the orders on the bail pleas of Gulfisha Fatima and Tasleem Khan after hearing the rebuttal arguments by Advocate Mehmood Pracha, counsel appeared on behalf of them. The Court will pronounce the order on March 11.

The court has already reserved the order on the bail pleas of other accused persons.

SPP Amit Prasad on Thursday rebutted that in the case of conspiracy, "we have to see the wholesome conduct of the accused. There are multiple chats and other evidence is there. He submitted that there is adequate material on record against the accused."

He referred to the chat between Tanha and Nadeem Khan and said, "They were masking themselves. If they didn't have anything to hide why were they in a secretive manner asking others to make WhatsApp calls."

He also answered the query about stepping in of Kapil Mishra and the eruption of riots only after that. He said it is not correct. Riots were pre-planned otherwise it was not possible to accumulate the chili powder and other things, he added.

He said we have seen the dislocation and disconnection of CCTV cameras at Chandbagh and Kapil Mishra was not there but the accused were there.

He submitted on the specific question asked by the court on Umar Khalid's speech at Amaravati, that the permission for this program was rejected on 11 February 2020 by the Maharashtra police. Again on February 12, another application was filed by an office-bearer of the Welfare Party of India mentioning six dignitaries except for Umar Khalid.

The Father of the accused is the national president of the party. Permission was given only for six persons, he said. Despite this Umar Khalid went there and gave a speech on February 17. An FIR was lodged in this regard for not obeying the order.

SPP argued that the Amaravati speech was a call to 'Chalo Dilli' (let's go Delhi) during the visit of US President Donald Trump on February 24, 2020. He also referred to the meeting of February 23 meeting which was attended by some accused persons. He said we can not see the role of the accused in isolation.

Senior Advocate Tridip Pais the counsel for the accused again rebutted saying that the said order and FIR were illegal because there can not be restrictions on right to speech. There are no such restrictions in the Maharashtra Police Act, he said.

He also argued that Umar Khalid was named as accused of the said FIR registered in the Amaravati matter. Nothing happened after the speech. The prosecution can not call it an act of terror because he gave a speech there. The prosecution is making a mockery of the prosecution of UAPA.

He further argued that the prosecution referred to chats and calls of other people. Their witness is talking about some other person, not about me.

He also argued that the 'Bharat tere tukde honge' remark was not attributed to me in chargesheet filed in the JNU case 2016. But this time the prosecution has this remark attributed to me.

This case is related to the Northeast Delhi riots in which 53 people died and hundreds had got injured. Delhi police had logged the larger conspiracy case naming Umar Khalid, Sharjeel Imam, Gulfisha Fatima including others.

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