On Tuesday, 13 September 2022, prominent human rights activist Umar Khalid will have spent two years in Tihar Jail under the draconian UAPA, accused by the Delhi Police of involvement in 2020 northeast Delhi pogrom.
“I am highly optimistic that my son will walk out of the jail very soon. I always try to motivate him and ask him keep his hopes high. Umar is very strong mentally and keeps himself prepared for every situation,” Khalid’s mother Sabiha Khanum told PTI.
Khanum was at a solidarity meet for Umar Khalid at Delhi’s Press Club of India on Tuesday.
“Not just bail, but all cases against him should be closed off or withdrawn,” said Khanum.
“Umar is facing all the ordeals inside the jail with utmost courage. Whenever I speak to him on phone, I ask him about his well-being. He does not share about his difficulties. He talks with a smile, always. We try to extrapolate from him the difficulties that he is facing. He faces all his difficulties beautifully,” she said at the event.
She went on to say: ”He has always been a polite, kind person, but he is very firm on his convictions. He was always worried about things happening around. After the Batla House encounter and the witch hunting he decided to stand with the oppressed. His cousins are professionally doing well. He was also very good in education but he chose to stand against oppression and question the powers. He kept asking questions since childhood and to this day continues to ask questions to the system.”
Gitanjali Shree, novelist and Booker Prize winner was the opening speaker at the solidarity event ‘In pursuit of Justice’.
She said she stands in full solidarity with the struggle for the release of Umar Khalid and with his family. In the name of law he is in jail for two years.
She said: “Our forefathers during the time of Rigveda asked questions and as a result we got the Naasdiya Sukta. Without asking questions even Upanishads wouldn’t have come. Prince Siddharth asked questions, searched for answers and showed us a new path. Dialogue that emerges from questions enriches knowledge. And it creates space for justice and humanity. But today people asking questions are being silenced and that is that has happened with Umar and others in custody. I want this unjust incarceration to end.”
Justice Anjana Prakash has taken this occasion to speak on the larger issue of keeping people behind bars at the trial stage.
“My position on UAPA is very clear. It does not fit in either with our criminal jurisprudence, which presumes a person innocent until proven guilty, and international laws on similar lines. By what understanding of jurisprudence has this basic tenet of criminal law been dislodged, I am unable to understand.”
She ended by saying that, “I am amazed as to how the courts have accepted the position which the legislature, in its enlargement of jurisdiction, has put a fetter on court’s wisdom by forbidding grant of bail. Whether or not an accused gets bail is a judicial exercise not the executive’s decision.”
Manoj Jha, Rajya Sabha Member from RJD said that It is unfortunate that 75 years after independence those like are Umar, Sharjeel and Meeran are behind the jail. the jail. Why are they in jail, he asked, “while on the other hand gang-rapists are being called sanskari!”
“We know the case against Umar is fabricated. How can they use sedition against students who were speaking up against something as draconian as CAA. Umar Khalid’s case is a classic case of justice being denied ruthlessly,” said ET Muhammed Basheer, Indian Union Muslim League MP.
“The corrupts, the murderers, the rapists are running scot free, some are even in parliament. And those who are addressing the people to protect the country, to protect education, for jobs, for the defence of our rights and liberties – be it Aishe, Dipshikha, be it students of Jamia of Aligarh, or Hyderabad, – are being crushed. Umar is an example of this disturbing trend,” said senior CPI(M) lease and former parliamentarian Mohd Salim.
According to Jawahar Sircar, Trinamul Congress MP, Umar is not only a victim of his political ideas, ideas that he as the right to have, but also a victim of the divisionist ideology in the country today.
“He has always been straight forward about his views and he is suffering for that. But isn’t it too much? I would never believe that Umar was communalist. Never. He fought for citizenship rights and I completely support him. Umar must be released. This state cannot continue to imprison 11000 men and women without a shadow of trial,” Sircar said.
“Umar’s incarceration is being prolonged without any evidence against him. He has always spoken against oppression, upheld Gandhian thoughts. Whatever he (Umar) spoke is well within the limits of freedom of expression, but it is being presented in court as some dangerous conspiracy. Umar has never spoken anything that can be deemed illegal!,” said Samajwadi Party MLA Rais Sheikh.
“We extend our solidarity for Umar Khalid. The govt today is very vindictive and using all the draconian laws to put all the activists and intellectuals in prison. On the other hand remissions are granted to rapists and murderers,” said Annie Raja from NFIW.
Supreme Court advocate Shah Rukh Alam said that the FIR against Khalid is “nothing but a political document.”
Alam said: “When the court tells us to keep politics away’, it is mostly when someone questions the policies of the government. FIR number 59 of 2020 doesn’t mention any offence and there’s no substantial evidence in the FIR. It is purely a political document and so was the state’s counter during Khalid’s bail hearing.”
The student leaders from Fraternity Movement, AISA and Hasratein also spoke at the event.
“We are speaking for Umar and Sharjeel and other political prisoners. But how does the public perceive this? The people in the marginalised communities are it seems supposed to be satisfied only to be allowed to live. They cannot demand the right to live with dignity. Sharjeel was saying the same. But the state has a problem when those from Muslim community and othered communities start demanding,” said Hiba V of Fraternity Movement.
“We learnt about democracy, secularism, meaning of struggles etc in our Universities, which are now being demolished. Umar Khalid and other comrades in jail should be assured that we will continue their struggle. Students these days are being asked whether you were part of protests, whether you were detained etc. Students are being intimidated even before getting admitted. However we will continue our struggles against this oppressive regime,” said AISA leader Neha.
Kaushal from Hasratein, Delhi University, said: “We are well aware of the journey of political prisoners from asking questions to jail. I have spoken to both Umar and Sharjeel in my days in JNU. They were arguing for non- violent modes of staging protest and that is all.”
The public meeting was moderated by Apeksha Priyadarshini from Bhagat Singh Ambedkar Student Organization, JNU. The meeting began with glimpses of the anti CAA agitations and the video that Umar had recorded right before his arrest as his last message before he went behind the bars.
“Umar always discussed the injustice that happened, not just within the campus, but also outside it. That is what made his voice distinct and hence, the people in power are scared of students like him. The fight of all political prisoners will continue even though this government tends to take action against all those who question their policies,” said another speaker JNUSU President Aishe Ghosh.
