Delhi court sends Sharjeel Imam to 4-day police custody in February riots case

New Delhi: A Delhi court on Wednesday sent JNU student Sharjeel Imam , arrested under the stringent anti terror law — Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act — to police custody for four days in a case related to communal violence in northeast Delhi in February. Imam was arrested by the Special Cell of Delhi Police on Tuesday for allegedly being part of a “premeditated conspiracy” in connection to the riots during protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act. He was produced on Wednesday through video conferencing before Additional Sessions Judge Amitabh Rawat who accepted the demand of the Delhi Police that his custodial interrogation was necessary to unearth the conspiracy in the case. Investigators had sought five days police custody of Imam to probe the case lodged under the anti-terror law. Others booked under the anti-terror law in the case are Pinjra Tod members and JNU students Devangana Kalita and Natasha Narwal, Jamia Millia Islamia students Asif Iqbal Tanha and Gulfisha Khatoon, former Congress Councillor Ishrat Jahan, Jamia Coordination Committee members Safoora Zargar, Meeran Haider, President of Jamia Alumni Association Shifa-Ur-Rehman, suspended AAP Councillor Tahir Hussain, activist Khalid Saifi, and former student leader Umar Khalid. Umar Khalid has not been arrested in the case yet. The police had claimed in the FIR that Umar and his associates had instigated people to start riots in the area and it was a “premeditated conspiracy”. Imam was also arrested on 28 January in the case related to violent protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act near the Jamia Millia Islamia University in December last year. The PhD student at the Jawaharlal Nehru University’s (JNU) Centre for Historical Studies has been booked on sedition and other charges after purported videos of his alleged inflammatory speeches made during protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) were circulated on social media. He was also arrested by the Guwahati police in a case registered against him under the UAPA in Assam. Communal clashes had broken out in northeast Delhi on 24 February after violence between citizenship law supporters and protesters spiralled out of control leaving at least 53 people dead and around 200 injured.