The Delhi Police on Tuesday opposed jailed scholar activist Sharjeel Imam’s bail plea within the 2020 Delhi riots conspiracy case, alleging that he orchestrated the round the clock protest at Shaheen Bagh in opposition to the Citizenship Modification Act (CAA) by involving members of Islamist political organisations, Jamaat-e-Islami Hind (JeIH), and the proscribed Well-liked Entrance of India (PFI).
Throughout his earlier hearings, Imam and his counsel had argued that his speeches didn’t advocate violence and that he was not a part of conferences planning the riots. (HT Archive)
Particular public prosecutor (SPP) Amit Prasad, representing the Delhi Police, instructed the Delhi excessive courtroom that the Shaheen Bagh protest was Imam’s “brainchild” and was organised regardless of resistance from locals. “He [Imam] formulated the Shaheen Bagh protest site… The local people were not supporting it. There is a contemporaneous record showing that people were not on the road on their own,” Prasad mentioned.
In accordance with Imam’s chargesheet filed in September 2020, the Delhi police had claimed that the Shaheen Bagh protest web site was the primary one based mostly on the “Chakka Jam model” and half of a bigger conspiracy that led to the February 2020 riots, which prompted a number of deaths and accidents. Imam, together with others together with Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) youth chief Meeran Haider and Jamia scholar Gulfisha Fatima, has been booked beneath the Illegal Actions (Prevention) Act (UAPA) for allegedly masterminding the riots.
On Tuesday, Prasad additional alleged that Imam’s speeches throughout anti-CAA protests in Delhi and Aligarh Muslim College (AMU) incited violence and outlined a timeline for the conspiracy’s execution. “He called for organising a chakka jam in the capital and for cutting Assam from India, challenging the country’s sovereignty,” Prasad added.
Imam, who had earlier been granted bail in a sedition case, stays in custody because of the bigger conspiracy case. Throughout his earlier hearings, Imam and his counsel had argued that his speeches didn’t advocate violence and that he was not a part of conferences planning the riots.
Imam’s submissions have been countered by Prasad, who claimed Imam’s speeches outlined a conspiracy, together with organising a “Chakka Jam” and difficult India’s sovereignty. “Speeches of Sharjeel Imam decode the entire conspiracy… In the previous speech, he said that he will cut India from Assam from the chicken neck, here he is challenging the sovereignty of the country to implement the law,” Prasad had submitted.
The excessive courtroom has scheduled the subsequent listening to for February 12, with directions for the prosecution to conclude its arguments.