New Delhi: Delhi High Court Monday sought the response of jail authorities on a plea by student activist Sharjeel Imam , in custody in a 2020 northeast Delhi riots case, seeking access to research material stored on a pen drive to complete his PhD.
Justice Sanjeev Narula issued notice to the jail authorities and directed them to file a status report, fixing Nov 2 for the next hearing. Imam’s counsel said he had been in custody since Jan 2020 and was in the final year of his PhD at the time of his arrest.
The special public prosecutor for Delhi Police said the state had not opposed the plea even before the trial court and only the jail authorities had objected to the pen drive and not to books before the trial court. He told the court that the pen drive contained several files, comprising research articles, books and screenshots of archival records required for Imam’s doctoral work. Imam was arrested on Aug 25, 2020, and booked under Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) for being one of the “masterminds” of the Feb 2020 riots that left 53 people dead and more than 700 injured.
His synopsis has been approved by University Grants Commission (UGC) and Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), he added.