The Delhi High Court on Friday agreed to hear during the day a plea by NewsClick founder-editor Prabir Purkayastha and Human Resources head Amit Chakravarty challenging their arrest in a case lodged under anti-terror law UAPA.
Senior advocate Kapil Sibal pressed it for urgent hearing before a division bench of Chief Justice Satish Chandra Sharma and Justice Sanjeev Narula.
“Arrest has been made illegally and in violation of the Supreme Court decisions,” Sibal said. The bench then agreed for the same.
Notably, Singh had earlier informed a Delhi court that a petition will be filed before the high court challenging the FIR and the arrests, highlighting that there was already an FIR with the Economic Offenses Wing (EOW), and the high court was not informed about the current FIR.
The Special Cell of Delhi Police had arrested Purkayastha and Chakravarty on Tuesday, and the next day, they were sent to seven-day police custody by a Delhi court.
On Wednesday, the court had allowed them to meet their lawyer besides granting them a copy of the remand order.
Additional Sessions Judge Hardeep Kaur of the Patiala House Courts had on Thursday ordered that Purkayastha and Chakravarty be given the copy of the FIR registered against them.
She had allowed their applications, which were opposed by the Delhi Police saying they were premature.
Special public prosecutor Atul Shrivastava had said that the accused had to first approach the police commissioner, who would then form a committee regarding the same.
Shrivasatava had also cited a Supreme Court judgement saying that the accused had to follow the step-by-step procedure prescribed by the top court. They could not “directly jump before the court”, he added.
Advocate Arshdeep Singh, representing Purkayastha, had argued that they have the right to obtain the FIR copy.
“They have not given us the remand order either,” he had told the court.
The lawyer had also cited Section 41D of CrPC (right of the arrested person to meet an advocate of their choice during interrogation) and said that it was an absolute right.
On Tuesday, in a statement regarding the search, seizure and detentions carried out in connection with the UAPA case registered by the Special Cell, the Delhi Police said that a total of 37 male suspects were questioned at office premises, while nine female suspects were questioned at their respective places of stay.
The police said that digital devices, documents, etc., were seized or collected for examination.
The Special Cell had registered an FIR in the case on August 17 under different sections of the UAPA and the Indian Penal Code against NewsClick.
In August, a New York Times investigation had accused NewsClick of being an organisation funded by a network linked with US millionaire Neville Roy Singham, to allegedly promote Chinese propaganda.
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