New Delhi [India], July 4 : Delhi's Karkardooma Court reserved its order on the bail pleas of Umar Khalid and Sharjeel Imam. They have approached the trial court for regular bail in the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) case linked with the alleged larger Conspiracy of the Delhi riots of 2020.
Additional Sessions Judge (ASJ) Sameer Bajpai reserved the order after hearing the submissions by the counsel for the accused and Delhi police.
The court is likely to pronounce the order later in the day.
" I will pass the order today if the dictation is completed. Otherwise, it will be passed on Monday," ASJ Bajpai said.
The accused have approached the trial court seeking regular bail after their earlier pleas were dismissed by the Supreme Court on January 5, 2026.
The bail plea of Sharjeel Imma has stated that there have been no significant developments even after 6 months of the Supreme Court judgement and he has been in custody for the last six years.
A separate bail application has also been filed on behalf of Umar Khalid.
On June 13, the court had issued notice to Delhi police and had sought a reply on Sharjeel Imam's bail plea from Delhi Police.
The court had issued notice on the bail plea of Umar Khalid on June 9.
It is stated on behalf of Sharjeel Imam that the second bail application has been filed in light of significant subsequent developments after the Supreme Court judgment of 05.01.2026.
The application also highlights that despite the passage of more than six months since the Supreme Court's judgment, there has been no meaningful progress in the trial proceedings, with arguments on the charge still remaining incomplete and the applicant continuing to undergo prolonged incarceration of nearly six years in this FIR.
Advocate Ahmad Ibrahim filed the bail application for Sharjeel Imam.
It is stated that as at the date of filing of this application, the matter before this trial Court has not progressed even to the stage of framing a charge. Arguments on the charge have not yet been concluded.
As was already noted by the Supreme Court at paragraph 118 in the Gulfisha Fatima case, recording the defence submission that the matter then stood at the stage of arguments on charge and that there was 'no proximate progression to trial in the conventional sense' - that position remains entirely unchanged six months later, the plea said.
It is highlighted that a coordinate Bench of the Supreme Court has, in the Syed Iftikhar Andrabi VS National Investigation Agency case, expressly held that the judgment in Gulfisha Fatima has hollowed out the constitutional force of the binding three-Judge Bench decision in K A Najeeb, and has made a clear departure from its ratio.
The plea has also highlighted that the very Bench that authored Gulfisha Fatima had thereafter passed an order on 22.05.2026 in the Tasleem Ahmed case, granted interim bail to a co-accused in the same in the larger Conspiracy case and simultaneously referred the entire legal question governing bail under Section 43D (5) UA(P)A to a larger Bench to be constituted by the Chief Justice of India.