“I want justice. I still believe in our Constitution, but justice is being delayed. This is a completely fake case,” said Kerala journalist Siddique Kappan as he was escorted out of a Mathura court in Uttar Pradesh on Tuesday.
This is the first time that Kappan was speaking to the media after he and Campus Front of India leaders Atiq-ur Rehman, Masood Ahmed, and a Delhi based cab driver Alam were arrested in October 2020 en route to Hathras to cover the murder of a Dalit woman.
They were arrested on the “apprehension of causing a breach of peace” but were later slapped with draconian charges of UAPA, sedition and Information Technology Act.
Kappan’s response comes at a time the Mathura court dropped the proceedings on charges related to apprehension of breach of peace against the four accused as the UP police failed to complete the inquiry against them within six months, as stipulated under section 116 (6) of the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC).
They have been discharged of the charges under Criminal Procedure Code (CrPc) sections 151(Arrest to prevent the commission of cognizable offences), 107(Security for keeping the peace in other cases) and 116 (Inquiry as to truth of information).
The other charges, including sedition and under UAPA, still stand.
“We have no connection with the case. We are being trapped. This is Yogi (Adityanath) government’s dictatorship,” Atiq-ur Rehman, another accused in the case, said he was also being taken into the police van along with Siddique Kappan.
