New Delhi: The Delhi High Court will hear on Friday a bail plea by former JNU student Sharjeel Imam in a UAPA case related to the alleged conspiracy behind the 2020 Northeast Delhi riots. Imam's appeal, which challenges the trial court order rejecting his bail application, is listed for hearing before a bench of Justices Siddharth Mridul and Rajnish Bhatnagar. In his appeal, the former JNU student, who is accused of making inflammatory speeches against the government on the Citizenship (Amendment) Act and National Register of Citizens (NRC), particularly at Jamia Milia Islamia University in December 2019, has submitted that in absence of any admissible material, the trial court wrongly found him to a part of the conspiracy to cause riots and there is no prima facie case against him for the commission of any 'terrorist act' under the stringent Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA).
He has submitted that he is a final year Ph.D. student having no prior criminal antecedents and the trial court failed to appreciate that the entire investigation is faulty and that there is no connection between his speeches and the incidents of violence. There is absolutely no material has been adduced by the prosecution, attributed to the Appellant from which it could even remotely be suggested that the Appellant at any point in time had any intention to cause/ incite violence. Rather from the material relied upon by the prosecution itself, which the Ld. Special Court has failed to take into consideration, it is manifestly clear that the Appellant to the contrary had on multiple occasions very categorically and emphatically called the protestors to not resort to violence at any cost, the plea stated.
It has also claimed that Imam was arrested by the Delhi Police as part of a targeted campaign against him and he was already in custody in connection with other cases when the violence broke out in North East Delhi and had no communication with the other alleged co-conspirators. On April 11, special Judge Amitabh Rawat denied relief to Imam who has been charged under various sections of the Indian Penal Code and the UAPA. Communal clashes had broken out in Northeast Delhi in February 2020 after violence between the Citizenship (Amendment) Act supporters and its protesters spiralled out of control.
PTI
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