‘Different footing’: Why Umar Khalid, Sharjeel Imam were denied bail by Supreme Court

In the judgment, the bench drew a doctrinal line between conceptual orchestration and on-ground execution.

The Supreme Court’s refusal to grant bail to student activists Umar Khalid and Sharjeel Imam in the 2020 Delhi riots conspiracy case rests on a key judicial finding that the prosecution material, taken at face value, places the two on a “qualitatively different footing” from other accused, attributing to them “central”, “formative” and “strategic” roles in the alleged conspiracy rather than local or episodic participation.

According to the bench, the FIR and successive charge sheets consistently portray Khalid and Imam as ideological drivers and coordinators of the alleged plot, operating at the level of planning, mobilisation and strategic direction from December 2019 onwards, immediately after the passage of the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA). (PTI)

In a detailed judgment running into 142 pages, the bench of justices Aravind Kumar and