THE SUPREME COURT TODAY adjourned to September 19 the hearing on pleas of Sharjeel Imam, former JNU student Umar Khalid, Gulfisha Fatima and Meeran Haider challenging the September 2, Delhi High Court order denying them bail in the UAPA case linked to the alleged larger conspiracy behind the 2020 north-east Delhi riots.
A bench of Justices Aravind Kumar and N.V. Anjaria adjourned the matter, stating that it had received the case files only late last night and did not get sufficient time to go through them.
"Got the files late last night. Did not get the time to read. We will hear the matter on September 19,” the bench noted, rescheduling the hearing.
The Delhi High Court on September 2 had rejected the bail pleas of Sharjeel Imam, Umar Khalid, and seven others — Mohd Saleem Khan, Shifa Ur Rehman, Athar Khan, Meeran Haider, Shadab Ahmed, Abdul Khalid Saifi, and Gulfisha Fatima. On the same day, another bench of the High Court had dismissed the bail plea of Tasleem Ahmed.
"Got the files late last night. Did not get the time to read. We will hear the matter on September 19,” the bench noted, rescheduling the hearing.
The Delhi Police had opposed their bail pleas, contending that the riots were not spontaneous but had been “planned well in advance” with a “sinister motive and well-thought-out conspiracy.” The High Court, in its order, had observed that prima facie the role of Imam and Khalid in the alleged conspiracy was “grave,” noting that they had delivered inflammatory speeches on communal lines to “instigate mass mobilisation of members of the Muslim community.”
Khalid has sought bail from the top Court in the larger conspiracy case registered under the stringent provisions of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (‘UAPA’). Imam, who was arrested by the Delhi Police in 2020 under UAPA, has been named as the main conspirator behind the riots.
The violence, which broke out in north-east Delhi in February 2020 during protests against the then-proposed Citizenship Amendment Act (;CAA’) and the National Register of Citizens (‘NRC’), had left 53 people dead and over 700 injured. The CAA was passed by the Parliament of India on 11 December 2019.
The amended law provided for the grant of Indian citizenship to the Hindus, Sikhs, Christians, Parsis, Buddhists, and Jains who came to India on or before December 31, 2014, to escape religious persecution in Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Afghanistan.