Delhi Riots 2020: Four Charged with Rioting, Murder After Eyewitness Account

Anwar Hussain, Kasim, Shahrukh, and Khalid Ansari have been accused of beating a man to death.

A Delhi court framed charges against four people for rioting, unlawful assembly, criminal conspiracy, and murder of a man during the northeast Delhi riots in 2020. Image used for representational purposes. 

(Photo: File Photo)

A Delhi court on Friday, 12 November, framed charges against four people for rioting, unlawful assembly, criminal conspiracy, and murder of a man during the northeast Delhi riots in 2020, LiveLaw reported.

Anwar Hussain, Kasim, Shahrukh, and Khalid Ansari were accused of beating a man identified as Deepak to death near Ambedkar College in February 2020, PTI reported.

Labelling it a 'calculated attack', additional Sessions Judge Amitabh Rawat observed in the order,

"By the manner of their mobilisation and intent as construed from their conduct, the said unlawful assembly can be said to have conducted itself for riots and other offences like the murder of deceased Deepak, in the prosecution of their common object."

Amitabh Rawat

"The conspiracy is also writ large by the calculated attack on the victim by the unlawful assembly," the judge submitted further, LiveLaw quoted.

The four were consequently charged with offences under Sections 147 (rioting), 148 (rioting, armed with a deadly weapon), and 302 (murder) read with Section 149 (member of unlawful assembly guilty of the offence committed in prosecution of common object) of IPC.

According to the judge, a man identifying as Sunil Kumar served as a key eyewitness, who said that the deceased was murdered by "armed Muslim mob consisting of accused persons", PTI reported.

Kumar reportedly hid behind a wall and saw the entire episode.

Communal violence had erupted in northeast Delhi in February 2020, after people protesting the contentious Citizenship (Amendment) Act and those supporting it clashed, leaving at least 53 people dead and over 700 injured.

(With inputs from PTI and LiveLaw.)