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Umar Khalid and Sharjeel Imam
NEW DEHI: During a Supreme Court hearing on bail plea in the 2020 Delhi riots case, Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, “There was an attempt to divide society on communal lines, it was not merely an agitation against CAA,”Tushar Mehta told the top court.Strenuously“First of all, that myth to be busted. This was not a spontaneous riot. It was a well designed, well crafted, well orchestrated, pre-planned riot. That will emerge from the evidence collected,” Solicitor General Tushar Mehta told a bench of Justices Aravind Kumar and NV Anjaria.“Sharjeel Imam says it’s his heartfelt wish for ‘chakka jaam’ for every city where Muslims reside. Not just in Delhi,” Mehta submitted.The solicitor general said a narrative is being built on social media that something very serious is going on with young people. However, the accused themselves are responsible for the delay in trial.Additional Solicitor General SV Raju, for Delhi police, is currently arguing and the hearing is under way.Khalid, Imam, Gulfisha Fatima, Meeran Haider and Rehman were booked under the anti-terror law and provisions of the erstwhile IPC for allegedly being the “masterminds” of the February 2020 riots, which left 53 people dead and over 700 injured.Meanwhile, the Delhi high court on Tuesday directed the police to update it on the status of investigations into the 2020 Delhi riots.A bench of Justices Vivek Chaudhary and Manoj Jain issued the direction while hearing a batch of petitions related to the February 2020 violence, including pleas seeking FIRs against several political leaders for alleged hate speeches. The bench noted orally that the petitions have remained pending for six years despite the availability of an alternate legal remedy that the petitioners had not pursued.During the hearing, counsel for one of the petitioners highlighted the deaths that occurred during the riots. The bench responded that FIRs had already been registered and the police were conducting investigations, leaving “nothing” to be addressed in the existing petitions.The petitioner’s lawyer, however, alleged that the police were not conducting a fair probe and urged the court to order an independent investigation.To this, the bench said: “You challenge it before the magistrate. The magistrate will supervise. These are questions of facts. We cannot entertain questions of facts in writ petitions. You can give that evidence to the magistrate, who will look into it and pass orders. The high court cannot do this.”Reiterating that the petitioners had not availed the appropriate legal route for six years, the court remarked: “These petitions are pending for so long for no good reason. FIRs have been registered and the police are investigating.”The bench listed the matter for November 21 and asked Delhi Police counsel to submit the current status of the investigation and the number of FIRs filed.
