New Delhi: The Delhi High Court on Friday refused to grant interim bail to Popular Front of India (PFI) leader OMA Salam, arrested in a case registered under the anti-terror law, UAPA, against the banned organisation and its members.
A bench of Justices Prathiba M Singh and Amit Sharma rejected Salam’s plea seeking a release for two weeks, saying he is “a person of great influence” who managed and administered the PFI for years, and enlarging him on interim bail would not only entail flight risk but also the possibility of several witnesses being influenced.
Salam had sought two weeks’ interim bail on the ground that his daughter died in April and his wife was in a “depressive state”.
Dismissing the plea, the court noted that Salam was given custody parole when his daughter died in an accident in April and his wife’s mental condition was neither debilitating nor of a nature that required an urgent intervention.
“Upon considering the fundamental ground of interim bail made by the appellant, that is, his wife not being well, the court on perusal of the medical records as also the overall facts of the present case holds that the present case does not reveal a situation which justifies grant of bail,” the bench said in its decision.
“The appellant in the present case is a person of great influence and was the chairman of the PFI, which is now a banned organisation. The observations of the Kerala High Court sufficiently capture the events that took place on September 23, 2022, that is, one day post the arrest of the appellant herein. The observations of the Kerala High Court reveal the nature of influence that the appellant wields,” it observed.
The court added that Salam has an immediate family, which includes four children, and therefore, there are family members to take care of his wife.
The court further said Salam’s refusal to meet his wife in Delhi while being in custody parole showed that his intention was “not to merely meet his wife but to visit the state of Kerala, which in the opinion of the court, is fraught with severe risk and likelihood of unforeseen consequences considering the influence that the appellant wields”.
“The appellant has a wide following amongst the members of the PFI who work on his directions and also have appeared to cause intimidation and commit violence. According to the NIA, the appellant is capable of creating fear in the public and even intimidating witnesses,” the court noted.
Salam, the chairman of the PFI, was arrested by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) during a massive crackdown on the banned organisation in 2022.
According to the NIA, the PFI, its office-bearers and members hatched a criminal conspiracy to raise funds for committing terror acts in various parts of the country and were conducting camps to indoctrinate and train their cadres for the purpose.
Preceding the nationwide ban, in near-simultaneous raids across the country as part of a multi-agency operation spearheaded by the NIA, a large number of PFI activists were detained or arrested in 11 states for allegedly supporting terror activities in the country.
The arrests were made in states and Union territories, including Kerala, Maharashtra, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Assam, Uttar Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Puducherry, Delhi and Rajasthan.
The government banned the PFI and several of its associate organisations on September 28, 2022 for five years under the Unlawful Activities (prevention) Act (UAPA), accusing them of having links with global terror groups like the ISIS.
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