Umar Khalid's Bail: How Ilyas' Narrative Tries To Trump The Law

On September 20, 2025, Umar Khalid’s father, Syed Qasim Rasool Ilyas, penned a caustic piece for the Indian Express titled “When Process is Punishment”. He argued that the latest bail denial was a collapse of constitutional safeguards that guarantee individual liberty. However, the portrayal of the Delhi High Court’s decision as an erosion of liberty is exaggerated and misses several important facts. By treating the UAPA as merely a tool of state repression, Syed Ilyas overlooks the realities of anti-terror law and the imperatives of national security. He ignores both the gravity of the case and established legal principles.

His article leans heavily on rhetoric rather than addressing real threats to India. The idea that Khalid’s continued custody under the UAPA is “punishment without trial” distorts both the law and the judicial process. To dismiss the UAPA as unconstitutional is risky. It undermines public trust in institutions that protect democracy against organised violence.

Conspiracy Trials and National Security

The February 2020 Delhi riots, which broke out during protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) and the National Register of Citizens (NRC), left 53 people dead and over 700 injured. It is misleading of Syed Ilyas to reduce the scale of such orchestrated violence to mere “protest”. The charge sheet which runs over 17000 pages points to coordinated planning, inflammatory speeches, and systematic efforts to disrupt public order. Courts cannot treat such allegations lightly when there is strong prima facie evidence of organised conspiracy.

The Delhi High Court’s decision to deny bail is not a casual affirmation of state power. It was a careful application of statutory safeguards designed for offences with grave implications for public order and national security. It is disingenuous to call the court’s decision a blind nod to the state when, in reality, it is grounded in the framework of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) and the Supreme Court’s binding 2019 Watali judgment (NIA v. Zahoor Ahmad Shah Watali, (2019) 5 SCC 1). 

Finally, arguing that bail should be granted simply because of the time served ignores Supreme Court precedent. The Watali judgment sets a clear balance between individual liberty and societal risk. Undermining this balance would put civil order in jeopardy and encourage impunity for those accused of mass violence.

Limits of Dissent and Rights of Victims

Syed Ilyas’s assertion that “peaceful protest” is being recast as terrorism is a rhetorical distortion. The judiciary has made it clear that dissent, protest, and advocacy, even if uncomfortable for the Government, are protected under Article 19. But this protection ends when dissent turns into incitement, conspiracy, or organised violence.

The charges against Umar Khalid and his associates are not about slogans. They concern evidence showing planning, coordination, and deliberate attempts to trigger targeted violence. This is not just speech. Reducing this case to a question of free thought is misleading. It makes it sound as though courts are jailing philosophers for their ideas. That is simply not true.

When criminal charges are confused with “intellectual persecution”, it undermines the real victims. Those who suffered targeted incitement and mob violence deserve attention too.

Even if the lament over trial delays in UAPA cases is valid, why is such outcry selective and one-sided? India’s criminal justice system is overburdened across all categories of offences. According to NCRB data (2023), over 75% of India’s prison population are undertrials, not just under UAPA, but in ordinary IPC cases as well. Judicial delays are a systemic problem, not an indictment of anti-terror laws alone.

It is also surprising that Syed Ilyas remains silent on the rights of victims and citizens terrorised by the riots and the conspiracy. Between February 23–26, 2020, 53 people were killed and over 700 were injured in the Delhi riots. Investigations uncovered patterns of planned blockades, targeted violence, and incendiary speeches. Pretending that this was “mere dissent” insults the survivors and trivialises the violence. To cast only the accused as victims while erasing those who suffered real violence reveals the skew of Ilyas’s narrative.

Application of the UAPA Framework

Decrying the bail denial to Umar Khalid and others under the UAPA is a rhetorical attempt to frame the judiciary and India’s security statutes as instruments of oppression. This argument misses the bigger picture. It ignores three important realities: the legal foundation of the UAPA, the special dangers it addresses, and the judicial discipline applied in such cases. Suggesting that the constitutional system is broken simply because it does not meet the personal hardships of those charged with grave crimes is misleading and dangerous.

Syed Ilyas presents the principle of “bail is the rule and jail the exception” as an absolute mantra in every criminal prosecution. This is a fallacious portrayal. The UAPA clearly sets a higher bar for bail in cases involving terrorism, organised conspiracy, or threats to national security. This is not judicial overreach. It is a constitutional and legislative safeguard designed to protect citizens from exceptional harm.

The UAPA is a special security law for a reason. It deals with a category of crime far removed from ordinary offences. Section 43D(5) of the Act requires a court to deny bail if there are reasonable grounds to believe that the case against the accused is prima facie true. This is not automatic. Courts must conduct a preliminary, objective review of the prosecution’s material before making this decision.

Such a provision is not merely a rubber stamp for government intention; rather, it is a rigorous safeguard. It has been tested repeatedly in Indian courts, requiring judges to actively scrutinise evidence and the case record.

In fact, several co-accused in the Delhi riots cases have been granted bail after careful judicial consideration. This shows that courts are not mechanical or biased. Claims that decisions are “pre-decided” undermine judicial integrity without evidence.

The charges against Khalid and his co-accused are not for "peaceful mobilisation" but for a "larger conspiracy" to incite widespread violence and riots that led to the deaths of 53 people. A constitutional court cannot provide blanket immunity for any activity casually labelled as “protest.” There is a thin line between legitimate dissent or protest and criminal conspiracy. The court’s decision correctly holds that conspiratorial violence, even if disguised as a protest, is not protected under the right to free speech.

Misrepresenting The Role of the Judiciary

The Delhi riots conspiracy case involves thousands of pages of evidence, dozens of accused, and a long list of serious charges. Calling the slow pace of such a massive trial “incomprehensible”, as Syed Ilyas does, ignores the scale and logistical challenges involved.

Yes, the Supreme Court has granted bail in some cases citing delays. But it has also made it clear that the right to a speedy trial cannot be applied blindly to cases of grave offences where public interest is at stake. The court’s job is to ensure fairness. Rushing the process would be a bigger injustice to both the accused and the victims.

Syed Ilyas suggests that courts have “rubber-stamped” state accusations under the UAPA, erasing the line between dissent and terrorism. In 2021, the Delhi High Court granted bail to activists Devangana Kalita, Natasha Narwal, and Asif Iqbal Tanha, holding that the state cannot conflate protest with terrorism. That judgment proves the judiciary’s independence and its willingness to push back against executive overreach.

But Umar Khalid’s case is different. The court found specific evidence, including communications, organisational details, and witness statements. Together, these established a prima facie case under Section 43D(5). The bar on bail here is not arbitrary. It is part of the legislative framework that Parliament created and the Supreme Court upheld in the Watali judgment of 2019.

Blaming the judiciary for applying a law passed by Parliament is misdirection. Ilyas goes further, suggesting the bench itself is part of a vendetta or that the process is punishment. He offers no proof. Such claims try to intimidate the judiciary into ignoring the law under the guise of compassion.

Criticising the UAPA is legitimate in a democracy. But demanding that courts toss aside statutes, precedents, and evidence whenever political passions run high is reckless. The real danger does not lie in the UAPA or the judiciary. It lies in biased commentary that spreads half-truths, delegitimises the legal process, and undermines public trust in institutions that uphold the rule of law.

Ilyas is not making a case for justice. Instead, he is making a case for emotion. He positions himself on a pulpit, delivering lofty sermons about what ‘should have happened,’ while conveniently brushing aside the hard realities of law and evidence.

He has no concern for the law, no respect for judicial reasoning, and no patience for constitutional safeguards. In doing so, he tries to impose his selective morality over established legal principles, dismissing judicial reasoning as if it were secondary to his narrative. His rhetoric is designed to cloud facts, delegitimise institutions, and paint every legal process as a state vendetta. It is not about justice or fairness for him; it is about claiming a false moral high ground, where rhetoric is weaponised to overshadow facts and emotion is peddled as truth.