The Delhi High Court on Monday told the Delhi Police to respond to a petition moved by activist Sharjeel Imam seeking bail in connection with a sedition and Unlawful Activities Prevention Act case, Bar and Bench reported.
A division bench of Justices Suresh Kumar Kait and Manoj Jain gave the Delhi Police two weeks to respond to Imam’s petition. The matter will be heard again next month.
The case pertains to speeches that Imam, a former scholar at Delhi’s Jawaharlal Nehru University, delivered at the Jamia Millia Islamia University in 2019 and the Aligarh Muslim University in 2020 during protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act.
The police alleged that in his speech at the Aligarh Muslim University in 2020, Imam had asked those protesting against the amended citizenship law to “cut off Assam from India” by occupying the “Muslim-dominated chicken’s neck”.
The so-called chicken’s neck, or the Siliguri corridor, refers to a very narrow track of land around Siliguri city in West Bengal that connects India’s North East to the rest of the country.
Imam was arrested in 2020 by the Delhi Police and booked on sedition charges.
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