SC dismisses plea by activist in 2020 Delhi riots

The Supreme Court dismissed activist Devangana Kalita's plea for reconstruction of case diaries related to the 2020 Delhi riots, citing delays and legal bars.

The Supreme Court on Monday dismissed the plea filed by Pinjra Tod activist Devangana Kalita for reconstruction of the case diaries in connection with the larger conspiracy case related to the 2020 northeast Delhi riots.

SC dismisses plea by activist in 2020 Delhi riots

A bench of justices Aravind Kumar and PB Varale dismissed Kalita’s plea who came up in appeal against an earlier dismissal by the Delhi high court on September 22, 2025 questioning the delay by her in raising this challenge more than three years after the trial began in 2020.

“What were you doing for three years? The trial commenced three years ago,” the bench observed, as Kalita’s lawyer Adit S Pujari told the court that the trial is yet to begin as the case is currently at the stage of argument on charge.

Pujari told the court about the mandate of law provided under section 172 of the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC) which requires police to make daily entry of the investigation carried out in the case in the form of a diary, providing details of the information he received, the time of beginning and closing his investigation, the places visited, and a statement of the circumstances ascertained through his investigation.

The bench questioned the right of the accused to seek reconstruction of the case diary referring to section 172(3) of the CrPC placing an express bar which states, “Neither the accused nor his agents shall be entitled to call for such diaries, nor shall he or they be entitled to see them merely because they are referred to by the court.”

Following a hearing that barely lasted for five minutes, the court dismissed the plea while being convinced that the high court was right in dismissing Kalita’s plea.

In her plea filed through advocate Kajal Dalal, the accused alleged that the case diary in her case contained “ante-dated” witness statements which indicated that the case diary was allegedly tampered with as the statements appeared to form part of another FIR belonging to the riots case.

Before the HC, Kalita’s lawyers cited Supreme Court decision in Bhagwant Singh case (1983) which has emphasised the importance of chronologically maintaining the case diary as part of the investigating agency’s mandate to ensure a fair investigation.

The high court concluded that denial of right of the accused to inspect the case diary is neither “unreasonable” nor “arbitrary” and in the interest of maintaining the confidentiality of the investigation, it is not desirable to make the police diary available to the accused on demand.

While dismissing the plea for reconstitution of case diary, the HC allowed the prayer of the accused to preserve the case diary. This relief was granted by the HC by an interim order of December 2024 which was confirmed by the high court in its September 2025 ruling.

The Delhi Police had alleged that Kalita, along with other activists had plotted to create unrest in Jafrabad (in northeast Delhi) under the guise of peaceful protests. The high court granted her bail in the Jafrabad violence case in September 2020. In the larger conspiracy case, she along with other activists got bail from the Delhi high court in 2021, later upheld by the Supreme Court the same year.