Delhi riots case: Why won’t India release Umar Khalid and Sharjeel Imam?

In connection with the 2020 religious riots in the capital, New Delhi, India’s Supreme Court has imposed bail on five Muslim students and activists who have been imprisoned for more than five years.

But the top court denied bail to two high-profile scholars – Umar Khalid and Sharjeel Imam – who will remain in the high-security Tihar jail waiting for their trials to start.

What’s the issue with this case?

The Modi government expedited citizenship for persecuted Hindus, Parsis, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains, and Christians from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, and Pakistan back in the year.

Muslims across India opposed their exclusion and launched protests, with a women-led sit-in in New Delhi’s Shaheen Bagh becoming the epicentre of India’s biggest protests in decades.

Hindu right-wing mobs attacked peaceful sit-ins in Delhi’s eastern district, erupting in a deadly riot, as a result of senior leaders’ anti-Muslim rhetoric spearheaded by the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leaders. The worst kind of violence in Delhi since the anti-Sikh riots of 1984 resulted in the deaths of more than 50 people, the majority of them Muslims.

In response, the police filed 758 criminal cases for investigation and arrested more than 2, 000 people. Legal and human rights experts accuse the Delhi Police of bias against Muslims and accused peaceful protesters of planning a plot to stoke tensions and overthrow the elected government. In a case known as the “main conspiracy case,” at least 18 student leaders and activists were detained.

The students and activists were charged under an “anti-terror” law called the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, which makes it virtually impossible to secure bail. This law allows for months, sometimes years, to detain individuals without conducting a trial.

India’s police are accused of using “anti-terror” laws more frequently against marginalized populations, including Muslims.

delhi riots — Demonstrators attend a protest against a new citizenship law in Shaheen Bagh in New Delhi, India, on January 19, 2020]Danish Siddiqui/Reuters]

The accused are who?

Six of the 18 students and activists who were detained in the conspiracy case were eventually released on bail.

Today, the Supreme Court is deciding on the bail of seven of the defendants. Their brief profiles are shown below:

Umar Khalid, a former research fellow at Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), published a PhD thesis titled “Contesting claims and contingencies of the rule on Adivasis of Jharkhand” in 2018. He is a former leader of the student body the Democratic Students ‘ Union (DSU) and a founding member of the campaign “United Against Hate”.

Sharjeel Imam, a PhD research fellow at the Center for Historical Studies at JNU. He completed his education at one of India’s most reputable engineering schools, the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Bombay, and then returned to school.

Meeran Haider: A PhD research scholar at the Centre for Management Studies at Jamia Millia Islamia.

Gulfisha Fatima, a graduate of the MBA program, actively engages in activism and community service. She was preparing to become a college lecturer at the time of the protests.

Shifa ur-Rehman: A businessman and the president of the Alumni Association of Jamia Millia Islamia. He lost in the 2024 election for the Delhi assembly, but he won.

Shadab Ahmed, a professional who holds a BCA bachelor’s degree. At the time of the protests, Ahmed was volunteering at a protest site in Delhi.

Saleem Khan, a businessman who works in the export sector. He was running his business at the time of his arrest, according to police, who claimed he organized and provided food for a protest site.

Why is India so divided over this case?

Civil society has referred to the conspiracy case and the defendants charged as a litmus test for the judiciary itself in response to Prime Minister Modi’s sharp shift away from ultra-nationalist and authoritarian policies.

Political analysts told Al Jazeera that the case, amid apparently endless hearing dates, changing benches in courts, and administrative delays, has split open the “dual nature” of Indian institutions that are biased against Muslims.

The Modi government had a reckoning, according to Asim Ali, a political commentator in New Delhi. He said, “This mobilisation cannot ever occur again.”

“That protest was a statement by India’s Muslim community that we are reclaiming our citizenship rights – and you cannot just snatch that”, Ali noted. However, the government has demonstrated that only they have the authority to impose a citizenship definition, and they did so with force.

However, Ali said that the top court’s decision to deny Khalid and Imam, the more well-known students who are detained, “is like treating them as internal enemies or suspects, treating them with another class of laws, or rather in a legal shadow,” was unfair.

Rasheed Kidwai, a political analyst, noted that Indian courts have regularly granted bail to the accused, including hardcore criminals and rapists. Is the court being influenced by a political narrative, according to the “denial] of Khalid and Imam’s bail? There is no reason why these two weren’t granted bail, he said, because of this.

For more than a billion Indians to continue having faith in the judiciary, Kidwai said, there needs to be “consistency of law that is equal for all”. He noted that this is not the case with Muslim defendants.

sharjeel imam — In this screen grab from a videotape from December 22, 2019, student Sharjeel Imam, a former co-organizer of a sit-in protest against a new citizenship law, appears.

Why will Khalid and Imam stay imprisoned?

The bench of Justices Aravind Kumar and NV Anjaria, who delivered its decision on Monday morning in New Delhi, stated that they were not convinced that Khalid and Imam’s protracted pre-trial detention and the delay in the trial were not “trump cards.”

The court noted that the pair’s position in the alleged conspiracy hierarchy was different from that of others who received bail. The bench said it found a prima facie case under the “anti-terror” law, stating the duo held a “central and formative role” in the conspiracy and can reapply for bail after one year.

“I believe that the government has unfairly influenced these judges.” And the government was under a lot of pressure to not release [Khalid and Imam], according to Prashant Bhushan, a senior advocate for the rights movement on the Supreme Court.

Now, the student activists are “basically in a deadlock”, Bhushan said, adding, “This case shows two things: the Modi government is willing to misuse anti-terror law and the investigative agencies, secondly, that courts are also bowing down to the dictates of the government”.

According to Bhushan, who has examined the case details, “the charges are serious, but there is no real substance behind those charges.”

Under the Modi administration, he claimed, India is no longer a democracy.

What effect has the case had on India?

Political observers and leaders claim that student politics have been intentionally banned since the protests against the citizenship law and the subsequent crackdown.

Natasha Narwal, an activist and researcher who spent over a year in jail in the same case, told Al Jazeera that due to the government crackdown, “any protest that presents a challenge to the regime and its policies is easily criminalised”.

“Every little activity is being monitored more closely at the universities, from putting together a seminar, a talk, a movie screening, or any other kind of gathering,” said Narwhal.