Sharjeel Imam ‘one of the kingpins of larger conspiracy to incite violence’: Delhi court

New Delhi  (The Uttam Hindu): Sharjeel Imam was not only an instigator, but was also one of the kingpins of a larger conspiracy to incite violence during 2019 anti-CAA protests, said a court here as it framed charges against the former JNU activist and other accused in the case. Additional Sessions Judge Vishal Singh of the Saket Courts said that in order to provoke the Muslim community and to incite widespread violence against the implementation of CAA and NRC, accused Sharjeel Imam conducted public meetings, distributed inflammatory leaflets in areas of Munirka, Nizamuddin, Shaheen Bagh and Jamia Nagar, prepared a video of the inflammatory speech and uploaded it on social media to influence Muslim brotherhood.

The judge noted that Sharjeel Imam visited Aligarh Muslim University and incited the students against the government for the implementation of CAA and NRC. “He visited the area of Jamia Nagar on 13/12/2019 at around 02:00 PM, where he held a meeting with Jamia students and local residents to instigate them to cause traffic jams on public roads in protest of CAA and NRC,” further noted the court. It said that Sharjeel Imam, being a senior PhD student, craftily clothed his speech in which he avoided the mention of communities other than the Muslim community but the intended victims of ‘chakka jaam’ were members of communities other than the Muslim community.

“Why, otherwise, accused Sharjeel Imam incited only the members of the Muslim religion to disrupt the normal functioning of the society. [H]is speech was calculated to evoke anger and hatred, the natural consequence of which was a commission of widespread violence by members of the unlawful assembly on public roads. His speech was venomous and pitted one religion against another. It was, indeed, a hate speech,” the court said. It added that the assembling of a huge mob and the mass-scale rioting committed by it was not a random or spontaneous happening and could not have been committed except in pursuance of a larger conspiracy entered into between the self-proclaimed leaders and initiators of the mob activity. Accused Sharjeel Imam is liable to be charged for an offence under Sections 109 IPC read with Sections 120B, 153A, 143, 147, 148, 149, 186, 353, 332, 333, 308, 427, 435, 323 and 341 IPC, and Section 3/4 of the Prevention of Damage to Public Property Act, the court said.

The Special Public Prosecutor argued that, although, ex facie Sharjeel Imam’s speech sounded like the creation of a peaceful public movement against some government policy, it was in essence an invocation of feelings of hatred of the Muslim community against other communities in the name of legislation of a law by Union government which was unfair to Muslim community. Sharjeel Imam and nearly a dozen people were reportedly involved in the alleged larger conspiracy linked to the Delhi riots of 2020, as per the Delhi Police. The riots broke out in the national capital in February 2020 as clashes between the anti-CAA (Citizenship Amendment Act) and pro-CAA protesters took a violent turn. The mayhem saw more than 50 people lose their lives, besides leaving over 700 people injured.