Activist and former Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) student Umar Khalid has moved the Supreme Court, challenging the Delhi High Court’s order that rejected his bail application in a case under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) linked to the alleged conspiracy behind the February 2020 riots in North East Delhi.
The High Court on September 2 dismissed bail pleas filed by nine accused, including Khalid, Sharjeel Imam, Gulfisha Fatima, Mohd Saleem Khan, Shifa Ur Rehman, Athar Khan, Meeran Haider and Abdul Khalid Saifi. A bench of Justices Navin Chawla and Shalinder Kaur observed that “conspiratorial” violence under the guise of protests could not be allowed.
Another division bench comprising Justices Subramonium Prasad and Harish Vaidyanathan Shankar separately rejected the bail application of Tasleem Ahmed. Most of the accused have been in jail for over five years.
Several of them have since turned to the Supreme Court. Imam moved the top court on 6 September, followed by Fatima on 8 September, according to Live Law. Khalid is the latest among the accused to seek relief.
The riots in February 2020 left 53 people dead and hundreds injured, with Muslims making up the majority of the victims. The Delhi Police allege that the violence was part of a “larger conspiracy” intended to malign Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government, claiming it was planned by organisers of protests against the amended Citizenship Act.
According to the chargesheet filed in November 2020, Khalid allegedly “coalesced a coalition of the current government haters that led to the formation of Delhi Protest Support Group on WhatsApp”. The police further alleged that, with the help of Imam, he mentored a JNU-based collective called “Muslim Students of JNU” to incite violence, and that he “remotely controlled” the riots after holding a “secret meeting” where plans were detailed.
Khalid has consistently denied these charges. His lawyer argued in court, “Merely being on a group is not any indication of anything wrong. In this case I have not even said anything. I only shared the location of a protest site when someone asked for it.” He added, “Someone sent me a message. If someone chooses to inform me, it is not attributable to me. Anyway, there was no criminality in the message.”
The defence has also stressed that the prolonged delays in the trial are grounds for bail, asserting that indefinite detention without progress is unjustified.
