The Wire photo.
Srinagar: In a case of an alleged ‘seditious’ article published in 2011 in a Srinagar-based online news portal and a Kashmiri scholar getting arrested in 2022, around 11 years later, a court in Jammu granted him bail nearly three years after the arrest. It was on February 8, the court of additional sessions judge in Jammu ordered the release of Aala Fazili, who is a postdoctoral scholar at the University of Kashmir, The Wire reported.
Fazili was arrested by the J&K Police’s State Investigation Agency (SIA) on April 17, 2022, over his article titled “The Shackles of Slavery Will Break”.
The court observed that there is very weak evidence which connects the applicant with the authorship of the article, and if the applicant, due to weak evidence, is acquitted at the end of the trial, his period of incarceration would not be compensable by any means.
Fazili was released from the Kot Bhalwal jail in Jammu following the court order, and The Wire reported that he reached home on Tuesday evening.
Fifteen months ago, the editor of The Kashmir Walla, Fahad Shah, was released on bail by the J&K High Court after he was arrested by the SIA in the case. Fazili’s article was also published in The Kashmir Walla.
SIA had claimed that the article was highly provocative and seditious, intending to create unrest and push youth to take the path of violence- creating communal unrest- by “brazenly glorifying terrorism and intended to abet the commission of unlawful activities across Jammu and Kashmir”.
Though the prosecution invoked Section 43-D (5) of the UAPA to oppose bail to Fazili, under which a court cannot grant an accused bail without hearing the prosecution, the court cited three Supreme Court judgements and said that denying him bail would be a violation of the Article 21 of the Constitution.