“He didn’t ask anybody to pick weapons, but…” Delhi Court’s remarks denying bail to Sharjeel Imam
New Delhi: In a significant development, a Delhi court on Saturday rejected the bail plea of Muslim activist and JNU research scholar Sharjeel Imam in connection with the 2020 Delhi pogrom case. The case involves allegations of sedition and violations of the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA).
Imam, a prominent figure in the anti-Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) protests of 2019, was arrested in January 2020. The court, presided over by Additional Sessions Judge Sameer Bajpai of Karkardooma Courts, underscored that although Imam did not explicitly call for violence or murder in his speeches against the CAA, his activities mobilized the public and disrupted the city, potentially contributing to the outbreak of riots.
“Although the applicant did not ask anybody to pick weapons and kill the people but his speeches and activities mobilised the public which disrupted the city and might be the main reason in outbreak of the riots.” The Court observed.
Despite having spent four years in jail out of a potential maximum sentence of seven years, Imam's application for statutory bail was denied. His lawyers argued that the Supreme Court had suspended the offense of sedition, and the UAPA provisions applied to his case do not entail a sentence exceeding seven years.
Delhi Police countered that the punishment for the offenses invoked against him should be considered cumulatively rather than concurrently. The court's decision followed an order from the Delhi High Court to expedite the ruling on Imam's bail plea. His appeal against the framing of charges is scheduled for a hearing at the Delhi High Court on March 8.
The court's order highlighted that Imam's speeches manipulated facts and incited the public, leading to disruptive activities and, ultimately, the riots. The judge remarked that Imam's words were so powerful that they captured the minds of a particular community, inciting them to participate in disruptive activities.
“Further, through inflammatory speeches and social media, the applicant skillfully manipulated the real facts and incited the public in order to create a havoc in the city. Further, the words as used by the applicant in his different speeches were so powerful that they captured the mind of the people of a particular community and incited them to take part in the disruptive activities which finally resulted into the riots,” the order said.
The court also noted that Imam's speeches resulted in an escalation of protesters and protest sites in Delhi, causing blockades on main roads and bringing the entire city to a standstill. The contents of Imam's anti-CAA speeches were deemed potentially "seditious" in the "dictionary meaning," according to the court's observations.
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Two injuries, one DNF, a DQ as India end messy World Relays campaign
Gaborone (Botswana) (PTI): Amoj Jacob and Ragul Kumar got injured during the men's 4x400m and 4x100 races respectively as India ended their World Athletics Relays campaign in disappointment on the second day of competitions here on Sunday.
The Indian camp had high hopes of making the 2027 World Championships in the men's 4x400m relay but the team did not finish (DNF) the race as Jacob suffered cramps and pulled out of the race after taking the baton from the first leg runner Dharamveer Choudhary. Rajesh Ramesh and Vishal TK were to run in the third and fourth legs.
Those teams which could not qualify for the 2027 Beijing World Championships by reaching the final round of each of the six relay events on Saturday were given another chance in the second qualification round on Sunday.
The top two teams in each of the two heats (in all six relay events) booked the Beijing ticket on Sunday.
India will now have to try and qualify for the World Championships through the Top Lists of the World Athletics, which is a long and tedious process.
In the men's 4x100m race, third leg runner Ragul Kumar fell down the track after failing to hand over the baton inside the exchange zone to fourth leg runner Gurindervir Singh, which clearly showed the lack of coordination among the runners.
Harsh Santosh Raut and Animesh Kujur ran the first two legs.
The Indian quartet was disqualified and Kumar was seen being taken away from the Field of Play with the help of the volunteers.
It was a comedy of errors in the case of the women's 4x100m race, which saw the baton being dropped during an exchange between first leg runner Tamanna and second runner Nithya Gandhe, though the Indians finished the race in 53.09 seconds.
Gandhe started running quite a distance, but after realising that the baton was not in her hand, she turned and ran back to pick it up.
The only silver-lining for the Indian contingent was the national record time in the mixed 4x100m relay race, though the quartet of Ragul Kumar, Nithya Gandhe, Animesh Kujur and Sneha SS finished sixth in heat number two with a time of 41.35 seconds, bettering the previous national mark of 42.30 seconds set in March in Chandigarh.
The mixed 4x400m relay quartet of Theerthesh P Shetty, Kumari Saloni, Nihal William and Rashdeep Kaur ended at fifth in heat number one with a time of 3 minutes and 19.40 seconds.
On Saturday, all the five Indian relay teams had failed to make it to the respective final rounds and thus missed out on the 2027 World Championships berths.
