Northeast Delhi violence: There is evidence of conspiracy, argues prosecution opposing Umar Khalid's bail plea

There is evidence of a conspiracy of violence, incitement to violence, preparation of it, funding, narrative building and meeting of minds by the accused person argued Special Public Prosecutor (SPP) for Delhi Police while opposing bail plea of Umar Khalid on Thursday in connection with Northeast Delhi violence case.

The Special Public Prosecutor (SPP) said that there is evidence of a conspiracy of violence, incitement to violence, preparation of it, funding of violence, narrative building and meeting of minds by the accused person in relation to Northeast Delhi violence.

At the outset of hearing on bail applications the senior counsel, Rebecca John appearing for the accused Khalid Saifi argued that some law news website tweet the whatsapp chats of Umar Khalid that was screen shared by the prosecution on Wednesday. She said it is really contemptuous. It should be stopped.

On this, the Court asked the media persons not to take screenshots during the court proceedings.

While the senior counsel insisted that the screenshots shared by the website be taken down, SPP Amit Prasad responded that an appropriate application may be filed for pulling down tweets that have shared screenshots from yesterday's hearing, that would be more appropriate.

SPP Amit Prasad argued before the Additional Sessions Judge Amitabh Rawat on the point of involvement and role of different accused persons in the conspiracy of violence and then shifting of blame to the police.

He referred to the statements of eyewitnesses in relation to the conspiracy and meeting of minds. In one of the statements, the witness said that post violence on 25 February 2020 he attended a meeting where Rahul Roy, Yogendra Yadav, Nadeem Khan, Saba Deewan and others were present.

He also referred to another meeting held on 22 February 2020 which was attended by a witness who deposed before the Magistrate that he went to a home in the DU area. In this meeting Gulfisha and other accused and Professor Apoorvanand were present.

Amit Prasad argued that Tahir Hussain was converting his white money to black money. All this money was used to fund protest sites, for violence and for purchasing weapons.

Prasad referred to a statement of an eyewitness who deposed before the court the Tahir used to give money to Suleman Siddiqui at chand bagh, to Gulfisha at Seelampur and other accused persons. Another witness deposed that he heard that some funds were coming from Jamia and some were from the terrorists.

He in connection with the sections of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) claimed that the action of the accused person shows that there was funding and preparation of violence. He said that even the preparatory act is punishable under UAPA.

He said that there is adequate material on record to show that there was a large scale conspiracy. He referred to the part of the charge sheet where it mentions, 'Musalmanon ke liye alag rashtra bananna hai (a separate country is to be made for Muslims)."

He argued that the sections of UAPA are made out against the accused persons as there was an injury to persons including death, damage to public and private property, disruption of supplies essential to life. There was fundraising and use of it for procurement of weapons and funding of sites.

Prasad also referred to the statement of accused persons recorded before police and the Court. He said that these statements are admissible and there is no reason for discarding them. He said the disclosure of the accused person was sufficient to prove the conspiracy.

He said that the entire violence led to the registration of 750 cases, 53 deaths, 13 Gunshot injuries, 34 incidents of Arson, 581 MLCs, 2 Police personnel died and 2400 people arrested.

He said that it was the public who really suffered and none of the conspirators.

He also described the roles of the six accused persons including Umar Khalid, Meeran Haider, Saleem Khan, Shadab, Saleem Malik, and Khalid Saifi. He said these accused persons were in touch with each other on the WhatsApp groups, they were presented in the meeting held before riots in which planning was done, they were in contact with each other after violence broken out, then participated in the narrative building.

( With inputs from ANI )

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