By Shemin Joy
Activists on Monday found fault with the handling of Delhi riots cases by the government and Delhi Police, saying it is not an investigation into a conspiracy but a conspiracy to incarcerate “innocents” who had raised in protest against the government on unconstitutional acts.
At a public meeting to mark one year of activist Umar Khalid’s continuing imprisonment after his arrest last year and demanding his release, Rajya Sabha MP Manoj K Jha, former Planning Commission member Syeda Hameed, lawyer-activist Prashant Bhushan and senior journalist Sidharth Varadarajan among others said there was a “massive cover-up” to allow the actual guilty people in the Delhi riots cases to get away.
The speakers at the meeting said the actual perpetrators of the Delhi riots were from the Hindutva brigade and police were complicit in not arresting them.
They also referred to the inconsistencies in the material used to apprehend anti-CAA protesters, including the video clip of a speech used to charge him and said that the authorities were using the riots perpetrated by Hindutva brigade to silence the anti-CAA protesters.
Speaking on the subject ‘Secular Protests and Communal Chargesheets’, RJD MP Jha said it was common people’s protest after the passage of anti-Constitutional laws like the Citizenship Amendment Bill and farm laws that gave hope, as politicians failed to act and the government was not listening to anyone.
“You cannot defeat the regime by becoming the photocopy of that regime. People want clarity. Only this clarity can now come through pressure from the civil society,” he said.
Referring to Khalid, a PhD scholar who was arrested on 13 September, 2020, Jha said, “if Umar Khalid can conspire to organise riots, he would not have been in jail but would have been a Chief Minister.”
“In these difficult times you will not find heroes in films, but behind bars for speaking up against the government. The government could not deal with Shaheen Bagh, hence it resorted to demonising it,” he said.
Prashant Bhushan said “public spirited”youth like Khalid and others supported and helped the “peaceful and non-violent” anti-CAA protests. “Police have ignored the provocative speeches from BJP leaders like Kapil Mishra. It was visible that those speeches were meant to create riots. The police beat up peaceful protesters. They helped the actual rioters but targeted innocents.”
“This is not an investigation into the conspiracy but a conspiracy to incarcerate innocents. If there is a probe into the conspiracy by police to target innocents, the names of their political masters will come,” Bhushan said as he joined the chorus of activists to repeal “draconian” laws like Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act.
Varadarajan said the story of the past one year was not just the story of gross misuse of police power and persecution of innocent people involved in nonviolent protests but also of a “massive cover-up” to allow the guilty in the riots to go scot free. He said the anti-CAA protests drew a large number of people to the streets, who otherwise would have kept aloof from such political activity.
“There was a wilful refusal to look at evidence. Even Khalid was arrested on bogus evidence,” Varadarajan said referring to the police admitting to the court that the less than a minute video clip on which they have built the case against Khalid was obtained from TV channels, which sourced it from a tweet by BJP IT cell chief Amit Malviya.
He said one of the arguments being made in the chargesheets was that the purpose behind the riots on the eve of Donald Trump visit, was to highlight anti-CAA sentiments and defame the Prime Minister. “This is a brazen lie given that international media had been reporting the protests since last December even before the visit was announced,” he said.
“Khalid can be arrested under UAPA but the Hindutva leaders who called for genocide against Muslims were booked under flimsy sections so that they can get easy bail,” he said.
Hameed said there was an inversion of perpetrators with victims in the Delhi riots case. She said Khalid’s only fault was to uphold the constitution and oppose CAA, NPR, NRC. “He saluted the women of Shaheen Bagh in Amaravati and called for upholding Gandhiji’s ideals. The regime was scared of this courage. For them, an educated Muslim is an eye sore,” she said.
Bharat Bhushan said, “an authoritarian state needs enemies, Khalid has been made into one. The BJP is threatened by a young crop of leadership that has emerged from the people’s movement. Devangana, Umar and the others are all part of the educated articulate non institutionalized organic leadership vouching for secularism and constitutionalism for religious pluralism, ecological justice, gender justice, justice for Dalits, – who scare this govt. That is why he is in jail.”
This story first appeared on deccanherald.com