Unequal Before The Law: Bail Is The Rule For Hindu Hate Speech, Jail The Norm For Rights Campaigners – By Kaushik Raj

On 10 August, the Delhi Police arrested 6 men for a demonstration organised on 8 August at Jantar Mantar in the capital city, where a crowd was seen chanting genocidal slogans against Muslims for several minutes. The arrested men included Ashwini Upadhyay, a Supreme Court lawyer and former spokesperson of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), who had called for the protest, ostensibly to mark the day in 1942 when the Quit India movement was launched.

A Delhi court granted bail to Upadhyay the very next day…. The courts did not take that view, however, in the case of Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) scholar Sharjeel Imam, incarcerated since January 2020 for his alleged involvement in the Delhi riots of February 2020. Clashes between groups over the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), 2019 in the Jafrabad area of Delhi turned into communal conflagrations across northeast Delhi over four days beginning 23 February, killing at least 42.

“Going by this argument, how can my brother be held responsible for the riots in Delhi that took place nearly 25 days after he surrendered?” asked Muzammil Imam, Sharjeel’s brother. “Is Delhi Police trying to say that he conspired riots while he was in jail?”…

This article originally appeared in Article-14.