The Supreme Court on Thursday dismissed the Uttar Pradesh government’s challenge to the Allahabad High Court order quashing the detention of Dr Kafeel Khan under the National Security Act, Live Law reported.
The Supreme Court, however, said that the High Court’s observation in September will not impact Khan’s criminal prosecution in other cases. “It seems to be a good order by High Court…We see no reason to interfere with the High Court order,” Chief Justice of India SA Bobde said.
After the Supreme Court’s verdict, Khan said that he had complete faith in the judiciary. “I got justice, I thank you all,” he said in a tweet.
The UP government had filed a special leave petition against the High Court order on October 26. The plea, which was also joined by the Central government, claimed that Khan had a history of committing various offences, which led to disciplinary actions, his suspension from service, registration of First Information Reports against him and the invocation of National Security Act.
In September, the Allahabad High Court had revoked the charges under the National Security Act against Khan. He had been in custody since January 29 for making allegedly inflammatory remarks during a protest against the Citizenship Amendment Act at the Aligarh Muslim University in December last year.
The court in its order had said that Khan’s speech did not “disclose any effort to promote hatred or violence” and had termed the three extensions of his detention as illegal.
Khan was a pediatrician at the Baba Raghav Das Medical College and Hospital in Gorakhpur, when 63 children died in 2017 due to lack of oxygen. He was suspended from his post and jailed for nine months after a criminal case of medical negligence, corruption and dereliction of duty was filed against him. But an Uttar Pradesh government inquiry last year cleared him of all charges and instead lauded his actions to save lives during the crisis.
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