Supreme Court Normalises Endless Incarceration; Venezuela is Merely the Front Line in America’s China War
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January 5, 2026
Siddharth Varadarajan
The Supreme Court of India today refused to grant bail to Muslim scholar-activists Umar Khalid and Sharjeel Imam, underscoring how prolonged incarceration without trial has been normalised in the name of ‘public security’. Arrested in connection with the 2020 Delhi riots in which Muslims bore the brunt of violence, the two have spent over five years in prison facing charges of terrorism under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA). The court held that there were reasonable grounds to believe their alleged conduct amounted, prima facie, to a “terrorist act” under the UAPA—a finding sufficient, under the law, to override the ordinary presumption in favour of bail. Khalid has now been incarcerated for 1,940 days, and Imam for 2,169 days, without their guilt having been tested in trial.
This is not an aberration but a pattern, as the fate of the Bhima Koregaon political prisoners has also shown. The UAPA’s bail standard effectively converts accusation into punishment, allowing the state to secure years of imprisonment on the strength of suspicion alone. The deeper question raised by the court’s order is not merely about two individuals, but about what remains of constitutional liberty when prolonged incarceration – justified by specious judicial reasoning (splendidly debunked by Gautam Bhatia) – becomes the process, not the outcome, of criminal law.
The bench of Justices Aravind Kumar and NV Anjaria did, however, grant relief to five others named in the case – activists Gulfisha Fatima, Meeran Haider, Shifa Ur Rehman, Mohd Saleem Khan, and Shadab Ahmed – stating that they were not on equal footing with Khalid and Imam. The latter can only move the court for bail again after one year, presumably beginning again at the trial court and slowly working their way back up to the Supreme Court. That’s a process that could easily take three or more years.
Shortly after the door was slammed on his face, Umar Khalid said that being imprisoned is his life now and expressed happiness that five other people had been granted bail, Khalid’s partner Banojyotsna Lahiri posted on X.
(Courtesy: X/@banojyotsna)
Meanwhile, convicted Dera Sacha Sauda chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh – a ‘godman’ close to the ruling establishment, walked out of Sunaria jail in Rohtak on Monday after being granted a 40-day parole. Singh, who is serving a 20-year sentence for raping two disciples, has now been released on parole for the 15th time since his 2017 conviction.
United States President Donald Trump has threatened India with the prospect of raising tariffs “very quickly,” saying that Prime Minister Narendra Modi knew that it was “important to make” Trump happy, in addition to the already levied 25% “penalty” on Indian exports to the US. Speaking to
