Former Jawaharlal Nehru University student Umar Khalid was arrested Sunday night for his alleged role in the large-scale community violence that erupted in northeast Delhi over the Citizenship Amendment Act in February, PTI reported.
The Delhi Police Special Cell arrested Khalid under the Unlawful Activity (Prevention) Act after nearly 11 hours of questioning. Khalid has been accused of being one of the main conspirators involved in the violence, an unidentified senior police officer said. The Hindu.
Khalid will be presented in court in Delhi on Monday. Unidentified police officers said The Indian Express that they are likely to file a charge sheet against you in the next few days
The activist group United Against Hate, of which Khalid is a member, said he was arrested as a “conspirator” in the violence. “The fairy tale narrative that DP [Delhi Police] has been spinning and criminalizing protests under the guise of investigating riots, find another victim, “the group said in a statement, according to NDTV.
Earlier this month, the Delhi Police Crimes Division had questioned the former JNU student.
Khalid’s name had appeared on the charge sheet filed by the police against suspended Aam Aadmi Party councilor Tahir Hussain. The charge sheet stated that on January 8, Hussain met with Khalid and United Against Hate co-founder Khalid Saifi at Delhi’s Shaheen Bagh during a protest against the Citizenship Amendment Act, where “Umar Khalid told him that he was prepared for something big / riots at the time of the visit of the president of the United States [Donald Trump]”.
In April, the former JNU student was indicted under the UAPA in another case related to violence. He was charged with instigating violence by allegedly making provocative speeches.
The former JNU student at the time had refuted the allegations against him and said he was falsely implicated. “It is an upside down world in which we live, in which these organizations and individuals who have worked for community harmony are involved,” he had said.
Khalid’s arrest came a day after police appointed Communist Party of India (Marxist) General Secretary Sitaram Yechury, economist Jayati Ghosh, University of Delhi Professor Apoorvanand, Swaraj Abhiyan leader, Yogendra Yadav and documentarian Rahul Roy, as people who had “encouraged” the fight against -Citizenship Amendment Law protesters as part of a plan.
The police charge sheet also attached two identical “disclosure statements”, in which the Delhi police claimed that Pinjra Tod activists Devangana Kalita and Natasha Narwal admitted not only their complicity in the violence, but also They named Ghosh, Apoorvanand, and Roy as their “mentors.” , who asked them to continue with the protests even if they led to violence.
Clashes between supporters of the Citizenship Amendment Act and those opposed to it broke out in northeast Delhi in February, killing 53 people and injuring hundreds. The violence was the worst seen in Delhi since the anti-Sikh violence of 1984.
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