Journalist Siddique Kappan’s bail highlights the low conviction rate in UAPA cases

By: Yash Gupte

The Supreme Court also granted Kappan bail on September 9, 2022, in the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Amendment Act case. He was nevertheless still incarcerated because of an ongoing PMLA case.

Siddique Kappan, a journalist from Kerala who was detained while en route to cover the 2020 Hathras gangrape and charged by the Uttar Pradesh government under the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA), has been released on bail on Thursday, February 2, 2023. The release orders in Kappan's bail case were granted by a sessions court in Lucknow. In a previous case under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), the Allahabad high court had given him bail. The Superintendent of Police was ordered to release Kappan if he is not wanted in any other cases by the release order. The Supreme Court also granted Kappan bail on September 9, 2022, in the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Amendment Act case. He was nevertheless still incarcerated because of an ongoing PMLA case.

Upon his release, Siddique Kappan said, “I have come out of jail after 28 months. I want to thank the media for supporting me. False allegations were put against me. I am happy to be out now.” The journalist from Kerala was arrested by the Uttar Pradesh police on his way to cover the gang-rape and murder of a 19 year old girl in Hathras which had attracted nationwide attention in 2020. He was arrested on October 5, 2020 and was charged under the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA) and was in jail for 28 months. He worked as a reporter with Malayalam news portal ‘Azhimukham’ and was also the secretary of the Delhi unit of Kerala Union of Working Journalists (KUWJ).

During his bail plea in the UAPA case, Uttar Pradesh government stated in court that Kappan was paid to provoke violence and that he is not an accredited journalist. "He was attempting to incite a riot and use explosives; he is a member of the PFI, which is a terrorist organization," said Mahesh Jethmalani, UP's counsel. The evidence against Siddique Kappan was called into question by the Supreme Court. "What was found with Kappan? No explosives were found, material was discovered in the car rather than with him, and they were not used for propagation," Justice Lalit explained.

The earlier arrest and the bail granted to Kappan has once again brought the UAPA on forefront. There are different opinions on the nature of UAPA after an amendment made to it in 2019 among different sections of the society and is one of the most debated and discussed law in the country. The original law was enacted in 1967. Under the amendment made to it in 2019, any individual can be declared as a terrorist who is found indulging in terrorist activities or in association with any terrorist organization. The chart below shows the number of cases registered under unlawful activities prevention act in last five years.

The lowest numbers of cases (796) under the UAPA were registered in 2020. The reason behind fall in cases can be attributed to the covid-19 pandemic and the nationwide lockdown imposed due to it. The year 2019 witnessed the registration of highest number of cases under the act. One of the major reasons behind this was the nationwide protests organized against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), 2019. Large number of activists, protestors and students were arrested under the UAPA during the protests in 2019. 2018 also came as a year with high number of cases under UAPA with the registration of 1182 cases. The latest data released by the NCRB for the year 2021 shows that 814 cases were registered under the unlawful activities prevention act. Maximum cases were registered in the UT of Jammu and Kashmir (289), Manipur (157), Assam (95), Jharkhand (86) and Uttar Pradesh (83).

The second chart shows the rise in pending cases. The number of cases in which investigation was pending increased from 1,857 in 2014 to 2,549 in 2015, registering the highest increase in a year. The number jumped to 4,021 in 2020. Interestingly, between 2017 and 2020, on average, 165 cases were charge-sheeted every year, which is only 16 percent of the average number of cases reported in these years.

If we take a look at the past seven years data, an average of 1,834 cases were sent for trials, which is 40.58 percent of the average yearly cases taken up for investigation. However, only 4.5 percent of these cases reached their conclusion. The rising pendency in cases under UAPA is one of the major reasons for its criticism.