By Sohini Ghosh
The Delhi High Court on Wednesday dismissed 2020 Delhi riots accused and activist Sharjeel Imam’s application seeking an earlier date of hearing for his bail plea, which was scheduled to be heard on October 7.
A division bench of Justices Suresh Kumar Kait and Girish Kathpalia said that there is no reason to advance the hearing date as a date has been fixed. The same bench had on August 29 posted the bail pleas of nine accused in the larger conspiracy case of the northeast Delhi riots, including former JNU student Umar Khalid and Imam, for October 7.
Imam submitted in his application that the appeal has been listed for hearing “at least 62 times before 7 different division benches” but the hearing never concluded on account of “frequent changes in the composition of benches owing to roster change, recusal and transfer of Honb’le Judges”, thus leading to a “fresh cycle of hearing beginning every such time”. The appeal was against a sessions court’s refusal to grant Imam bail.
In the application filed on September 2, it was submitted that the bail plea was last listed for final hearing on August 29 but the matter was adjourned on the day and kept for final hearing on October 7, despite the plea being pending before the high court since April 2022. It was also pointed out that the last substantial hearing was before a division bench of Justices Kait and Manoj Jain where Imam’s side had concluded the arguments but the prosecution could not complete its arguments before another bench change was effected.
Citing provisions of the NIA Act, Imam pointed out that the Act notes that appeals under Section 21 of the Act shall as far as possible be disposed within three months from the date of admission of the appeal.
This story was originally published in indianexpress.com. Read the full story here.
