On Tuesday, while hearing Bhim Army chief Chandrashekhar Azad's bail plea, Delhi High Court Judge slammed Delhi Police and said that they were behaving as if Jama Masjid was Pakistan.
The bail hearing of Bhim Army chief Chandrashekhar Azad witnessed some crucial observations made by Judge Kamini Lau. According to Live Law, The Public Prosecutor opposed the bail application saying that Azad had incited violence through his social media posts. Initially, the prosecutor refused to share the posts, but later read some of the posts.
Later, the judge noted that posts mentioned Azad's call for protests and dharna near Jama Masjid. That is when the judge said, "What is wrong with dharna? What is wrong with protesting? It is one's constitutional right to protest." "You are behaving as if Jama Masjid is Pakistan. Even if it was Pakistan, you can go there and protest. Pakistan was a part of undivided India", the judge said, reported Live Law.
Azad, currently in judicial custody, claimed he has been falsely implicated as the allegations levelled against him in the FIR were not only "ill-founded", also "improbable". The bail plea, filed through advocate Mehmood Pracha, alleged that no specific incriminating role has been attributed to Azad in the FIR, whose contents were "vague" and based on "conjectures and surmises".
It said he was at all times demonstrably making efforts to maintain peace. Azad's outfit had called for a protest march from Jama Masjid to Jantar Mantar against the amended Citizenship Act on December 20, without police permission. The other 15 people arrested in the case were granted bail by the court on January 9. Azad's plea further said that he was willing to fully cooperate with the investigation in the case and would not tamper with any evidence or influence any witnesses.
The bail plea claimed that charging him with being a part of an unlawful assembly was "erroneous", as at no point of time during the alleged incident did the police authorities declare the peaceful protestors to be an unlawful assembly.
(Inputs from Agencies)
