Northeast Delhi violence: No case of conspiracy made out against Umar Khalid, says counsel
Jul 28, 2022
New Delhi [India], July 28 : The lawyer appearing for Umar Khalid on Thursday concluded his arguments on the bail plea. He submitted that no case of conspiracy is made out against his client and there are major contradictions in the statement of witnesses in the northeast Delhi violence case.
The division bench of Justice Siddharth Mridul and Justice Rajnish Bhatnagar after hearing the submission of senior counsel for Umar Khalid listed the matter for prosecution argument on August 1, 2022.
Senior counsel Tridip Pais for Umar Khalid submitted that no case of conspiracy is made out against his client. He also submitted that there are contradictions in the statement of prosecution witnesses recorded under Sections 161 and 164 of IPC.
He also submitted that no incident of violence had been attributed to the speech given by Umar Khalid. No witness said he was present at the site of the violence. There is no connection between speech and violence.
He also submitted that the statements recorded in August and September before the arrest shows that the material against him was built up.
He also said Umar Khalid was a member of the WhatsApp group but not an administrator of the group.
The bench asked the counsel to clarify the conspiracy under different Acts.
He referred to various judgments by the Supreme Court on the point of conspiracy under UAPA, MCOCA, TADA and POTA.
The Delhi High Court on May 30, 2022 while hearing the argument on Umar Khalid's bail plea, had said that Umar Khalid's Amaravati speech doesn't fall under terrorist activity. "We understand that extremely well. We will give the opportunity to prosecution."
The said speech was allegedly given by Umar in Amaravati on 17 February 2020. He was booked under UAPA by Delhi Police and was arrested on 13 September 2020.
Justice Siddharth Mridul had said if the case of the prosecution is based on the premise of how the offensive speech was that by itself won't constitute an offence. "We will give opportunity", he said.
Justice Mridul had further said, "It may tantamount to defamation but it doesn't tantamount to terrorist activity."
Earlier the bench had called the speech offensive and obnoxious. He said that the speech was hateful and not acceptable.
Umar Khalid has challenged the trail court order denying him bail in the larger conspiracy of North East Delhi riots of February 2020.
Senior Advocate Tridip Pais had argued that there is no material, no basis of allegations in the charge sheet. It is based in hearsay.
He had argued, by referring to the picture taken from Facebook, that this is one picture and there are many others. Anyone who wants to hatch a conspiracy would upload the photographs in Facebook.
During during argument on May 23, he argued that Sharjeel Imam had criticized a secular movement against CAA and Khalid does not agree with it.
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 larger conspiracy of North East Delhi riots of February 2020. In these riots 53 people died and hundreds were injured.
