Former Delhi University professor SAR Geelani's family on Monday said "differential" treatment is being meted out to him as his name has not figured in the public support that poured in for the Jawaharlal Nehru University students following the police crackdown on the campus.
PTI reported that Geelani was arrested on February 15 for allegedly shouting anti-national slogans at an event organised at the Delhi Press Club on the death anniversary of Parliamentary attack convict Afzal Guru. While JNU students' Union President Kanhaiya Kumar got interim bail on March 3 after spending 21 days in prison on similar sedition charges, two other students, Umar Khalid and Anirban Bhattacharya, along with Geelani are still in prison.
Geelani's brother Bismillah said, “There are many, including us, who are party to the agitation against the booking of JNU students in a sedition case over an event against the hanging of Afzal Guru, but will JNU stand for SAR Gilani, who has been charged with the same offence?” He said that though JNU is "known for making everybody's headache its own", it has stayed silent on Geelani so far. In 2001, Geelani was arrested in the Parliament attack case on charges of planning the attack, but was later acquitted.
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