Law & Justice

Delhi Police Files Motion to Cancel Sharjeel Imam’s Interim Bail Over Media Interaction Allegations

By Arnabjit Sur

Delhi Police has filed a plea to cancel the interim bail granted to student leader Sharjeel Imam in the 2020 Delhi riots conspiracy case, alleging that he violated bail conditions by interacting with media personnel during his temporary release. The plea, presented by Special Public Prosecutor Madhukar Pandey, will be heard by Additional Sessions Judge Sameer Bajpai of the Karkardooma courts on Saturday. On September 22, the court had granted Imam seven days of interim bail, from October 4 to October 10, to attend his cousin’s wedding, subject to conditions that barred him from using social media and from interacting with the media. In its plea, the police cited a video that was reportedly circulating in the media in which Imam “could be clearly seen” interacting with media persons. The police stated that “the accused grossly violated the aforesaid condition that he shall not come in contact of any media person,” describing his conduct as “wilful and deliberate.” They argued that Imam had misused the liberty granted by the court and sought cancellation of his interim bail. Imam was arrested on January 28, 2020, and booked under the stringent Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA). The police have alleged that he was a key intellectual architect of the conspiracy behind the February 2020 communal riots in northeast Delhi, which left 53 people dead and hundreds injured. In a related development, Additional Sessions Judge Bajpai on July 5 rejected fresh bail pleas filed by Imam and co‑accused Umar Khalid, citing a January 5 Supreme Court order that denied them bail and laid down conditions for reviving their applications. The two had relied on a May 18 Supreme Court judgment that granted bail to Syed Iftikhar Andrabi in a narco‑terror case investigated by the National Investigation Agency. In that ruling, a bench of Justices BV Nagarathna and Ujjal Bhuyan expressed “serious reservations” about the reasoning adopted in the January 5 order. However, the trial court noted that the apparent divergence between the two Supreme Court rulings had been referred to a larger bench and said the fresh bail pleas could not be considered until the issue was resolved.