Delhi High Court Adjourns Hearing On Umar Khalid’s Bail Plea

New Delhi:

The Delhi High Court on Monday adjourned the hearing on the bail plea of Umar Khalid in the North East Delhi violence case due to the non-availability of his counsel. His counsel senior advocate Trideep Pais has contracted COVID-19.

In April, Umar Khalid challenged the denial of bail in the larger conspiracy of North East Delhi riots 2020. The division bench headed by Justice Siddharth Mridul adjourned the hearing for two weeks. Now the matter will be heard on July 27. This matter was to be heard at 2:15 pm today.

Karkardooma Court had denied bail to former Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) student Umar Umar Khalid in March 2022. He was booked under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act by Delhi Police and was arrested on September 13, 2020.

On the last hearing on May 30, while hearing the argument on Umar Khalid’s bail plea, the bench said the Amaravati speech was in bad taste, but that doesn’t make the speech terrorist activity. “We understand that extremely well. We will give the opportunity to prosecution,” the court said.

The said speech was allegedly given by Umar Khalid in Amaravati on February 17, 2020.

Justice Siddharth Mridul had said, “If the case of the prosecution is based on the premise of how offensive a speech it was, then that by itself won’t constitute an offence. We will give the opportunity.”

The bench had further said it may be tantamount to defamation but it doesn’t amount to terrorist activity.

Earlier during a hearing in April 2023, the bench had called the speech offensive and obnoxious.

However, senior advocate Tridip Pais had argued that there was no material and no basis for allegations in the charge sheet and that It was based only on hearsay.

During an argument on May 23, 2022, he argued that Sharjeel Imam had criticized a secular movement against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), and Umar Khalid does not agree with it.

Tridip Pais had said, “I am (Umar Khalid) being lumped with a person who calls for a deeply communal protest against CAA. There is no ideological meeting of minds.”

This case pertains to the larger conspiracy of the North East Delhi riots of February 2020. In these riots, 53 people died and hundreds were injured.

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