Delhi Police's integrity challenged after chargesheet against Dr. Umar Khalid and others leaked
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Sharjeel Imam and Umar Khalid (file photos)
New Delhi: After various news outlets on Monday reported the content in the supplementary charge-sheet filed in case registered in connection with the violence in northeast Delhi in February, Delhi Police's integrity has come under question.
On Sunday, the Delhi Police had filed a supplementary charge-sheet before Additional Sessions Judge Amitabh Rawat in a case against Dr. Umar Khalid, Sharjeel Imam and Faizan Khan related to the alleged larger conspiracy behind the violence.
India Today, Zee News and others reported that the accused were charged on various grounds including sedition, criminal conspiracy, murder, rioting, sedition, and unlawful assembly and promoting enmity.
According to the reports, young scholars Umar Khalid and Sharjeel Imam, who are now in judicial custody in the case, were accused of hatching conspiracy with citations to their academic works and articles published in leading digital media platforms.
As various media platforms reported it quoting leading portals, TV channels also took up the issue for debating it in their prime-time slots.
Now a question is being raised on how the media got access to the documents filed in a case that is sub-judice.
Prominent activist Saket Gokhale, has issued a notice to Delhi Police's Special Cell seeking an explanation on the leak of the police charge-sheet. He pointed out that while even the lawyers of the accused have not yet been provided a copy of the charge-sheet, the source of the leak naturally would be some officials of the Delhi Police Special Cell who are the only ones privy to it.access into it.
Saket also reminded that the Karkardooma District Court had ordered that pen drives containing copies of the chargesheet be returned and destroyed as they contained information on 15 witnesses in the case.
The chargesheet in the Delhi Pogrom case was leaked by @DelhiPolice to India Today & TOI with allegations about Umar Khalid.
— Saket Gokhale (@SaketGokhale) November 25, 2020
Have sent a notice to Special Cell asking how this was leaked & for ordering a probe.
Delhi Police is attempting a media trial here. Can't be allowed. pic.twitter.com/a0i75bkAtZ
Recently, various courts had deprecated the trend of investigating officers in sensational cases to leak records of the cases to media thus giving them wide publicity.
Delhi High Court had issued a notice to Zee News to disclose the source from which it got a confessional statement of an accused in a case pertaining to northeast Delhi violence.
On 15th October, the Kerala High Court had warned of "stringent action" against the general trend of divulging the materials collected during the pendency of any investigation, to the public/media.