A Delhi court on Monday framed charges against activist Sharjeel Imam for allegedly making inflammatory speeches during the protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act between December 2019 and January 2020, reported Live Law.

The case pertains to four speeches made by Imam in Aligarh Muslim University, Delhi’s Jamia Millia Islamia University, Gaya in Bihar and Asansol in West Bengal.

The charges have been framed under Indian Penal Code sections 124A (sedition), 153A (promoting enmity grounds of religion, race), 153B (making statements provoking breach of peace) and 505(2) (statements made which are alarming, false intention to create disharmony) and Section 13 (punishment for unlawful activities) of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act.

Advertisement

Imam’s advocate Talib Mustafa confirmed to Scroll.in that the charges have been framed but the order is yet to come. The order is likely to be available on Tuesday.

Meanwhile, the court denied bail to Imam in the case, Mustafa told Scroll.in.

In his speeches, Imam had purportedly asked the protestors to “cut off Assam from India” by occupying the “Muslim-dominated Chicken’s Neck”.

The comment was widely perceived as secessionist, but Imam later claimed that he had called for peaceful protests to “block roads going to Assam” – “basically a call for chakka jam”.

Advertisement

Cases against Imam were also filed in Uttar Pradesh’s Aligarh, Assam and Arunachal Pradesh for the purported comments. The activist got bail in all these cases.

However, he continues to be lodged in Tihar jail since he has also been charged in the Delhi riots conspiracy case and the Jamia protest violence case.

The Delhi Police have claimed in the First Information Report that there was a larger conspiracy that led to the violence that erupted in the national capital in February 2020, in which 53 people, mostly Muslims, were killed.