SIMI men’s bail plea rejected

Published October 7, 2001

NEW DELHI, Oct 6: Three activists of a banned Muslim student organization arrested for alleged links with Kashmiri groups were refused bail on Saturday, a report said.

The Press Trust of India (PTI) said a Delhi court refused bail for the three members of the radical Students Islamic Movement of India (SIMI) as there was “substantial evidence” to support the charge that the group was promoting ill-will among India’s different religious communities.

The three were arrested in New Delhi on September 28, along with SIMI’s national chief Shahid Badr, on charges of raising provocative slogans in protest against a two year ban on the organisation.

“After seeing the material collected by the (Delhi) police, I am convinced that there is substantial evidence that SIMI in its publications and audio-visual cassettes is propogating that Muslims cannot be part of national mainstream of India,” PTI quoted Metropolitan Magistrate Vinod Kumar as saying.

Four people were killed in Lucknow after police fired on demonstrators protesting against the ban on the radical Muslim group on Sept 27.—AFP