The Supreme Court has dismissed Uttar Pradesh government’s appeal seeking charges against Dr Kafeel Khan under the National Security Act (NSA) for a speech he gave against the Citizenship Amendment Act.
SA Bobde, the Chief Justice of India, said, “Criminal cases will be decided on their own merits. You cannot use a preventive detention order in another case,” while confirming the Allahabad High Court order which had freed the doctor.
Agreeing with the ‘good’ order of the High Court, he said that the Apex Court sees no reason to interfere with the order and added that the observations will not affect the prosecution on criminal cases.
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On September 1, the Yogi Adityanath led government challenged the High Court’s verdict which cancelled the detention of Khan under the NSA while calling it ‘illegal.’
Reacting to the order, the doctor said that the UP government has failed to imprison him and put him behind bars and that too on the day his brother is getting married. He thanked the judiciary and also all people across the world who supported and prayed for him for the past three and a half years.
In January, the Gorkhapur-based doctor was arrested over an alleged ‘inflammatory’ speech that he gave in 2019 at the Aligarh Muslim University. This was during a protest which was organised against the Citizenship Amendment Act, 2019.
Khan was then slammed with charges under the NSA for “disturbing public order in the city and creating an atmosphere of fear and insecurity within the citizens of Aligarh.” The High Court said that the doctor’s speech did not show or promote hate or violence and had scrapped the detention order.
Khan was first charged for his alleged promotion of enmity between different groups on religious grounds. The charges under the NSA was invoked later on after he was given bail on February 10. According to the UP government, the doctor had a history of committing offences that led to disciplinary action, suspension from service, registration of police cases, and the national security act.
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