New Delhi: The Delhi high court on Wednesday granted interim bail for six months to JNUSU president Kanhaiya Kumar, who was arrested on charges of sedition, but said categorically that the “slogans raised in the programme can’t be termed as freedom of expression”.
The conditional interim bail mandates that Kanhaiya must cooperate fully in the ongoing investigation and present himself when required before the investigators. Kanhaiya, who is now in judicial custody at Tihar Jail, is likely to be released on Thursday after he furnishes a bail bond of Rs 10,000 and a surety of like amount at the Patiala House court.
The high court directed Kanhaiya should “not participate actively or passively in any activity which may be termed as anti-national” and told him that as president of the JNU students’ union he should “make all efforts within his power to control anti-national activities in the campus”.
The court also made strong remarks about the slogans that were allegedly raised by the students, including the other accused, saying they cannot claim protection under the fundamental right to speech and expression, particularly as the investigation into the case was at a nascent stage. Further, Justice Pratibha Rani was critical of the slogans at the February 9 event on the JNU campus eulogising Parliament attack convict Afzal Guru and Maqbool Bhat, mastermind of the hijack of a passenger plane to Lahore in 1971 who was hanged in 1984.
“The feelings or protest reflected in the slogans need introspection by the student community whose photographs are available on record holding posters, carrying photographs, of Afzal Guru and Maqbool Bhat,” the judge said, while ordering Kanhaiya’s release. He also cannot leave the country without the permission of the trial court.
‘Kanhaiya has an intellectual attitude’
Justice Pratibha Rani also considered his family background, that his mother is an anganwadi worker earning a paltry amount of Rs 3,000 on which the entire family survives, to fix the bail amount.
The 23-page detailed order says the court doesn’t appreciate the thoughts reflected at the university event. “I consider this a kind of infection from which such students are suffering which needs to be controlled/cured before it becomes an epidemic,” said the court order. The court said Kanhaiya has an intellectual attitude, but added that as president of a students’ body he will be held responsible for activities in the campus.
The order was orally announced at 7 pm in a jampacked courtroom.
Soon after the high court granted him bail, hundreds of students, teachers and social activists who had taken out a march from Mandi House to Parliament Street police station in support of Kanhaiya turned it into a celebration, with many hailing the country’s judiciary for giving justice to their “innocent” leader. The protesters, however, made a strong pitch for dropping the sedition charges, not only against Kanhaiya but also against two other students, Umer Farooq and Anirbhan Bhattacharya, who too are in Tihar Jail. Many protesters shouted slogans like “Don’t Target JNU”, “Drop Sedition Charges against Kanhaiya”.
In Bihar, Kanhaiya’s father said his son was not a traitor. “My son is not a traitor, he will be proven innocent soon,” he said. His brother said the sedition case was based on a doctored video and that the truth will prevail.
Kanhaiya was arrested February 12 in the sedition case, in which he and others, including two more JNU students, are accused of raising anti-India slogans at the February 9 event on the JNU campus.
Kanhaiya sought bail claiming he had not raised any “anti-India” slogans but the Delhi police had told the high court it had “evidence” to show the accused had raised such slogans. The bench had put some tough questions to the police on slapping sedition charges on the accused and asked it to produce evidence showing his “active role” in raising “anti-India” slogans.
Defence lawyers, including Kapil Sibal, had countered these charges, saying “some outsiders with covered faces had raised anti-India slogans and Kanhaiya Kumar was seen in CCTV footage asking them for their identity cards”.
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