New Delhi : The Delhi Police Crime Branch, which filed its first charge-sheet in connection with the Jahangirpuri riots that took place in April, has claimed the incident was in continuation of the protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) and the National Register of Citizens (NRC) in southeast Delhi’s Shaheen Bagh.

“From the investigation conducted so far and material on record, it is established that the present incident was in continuation of the protests against CAA and NRC of 2019 and 2020 in Shaheen Bagh and the north-east Delhi riots of February 2020, which got further aggravated after Ram Navami incidents on April 2022 in different parts of the country,” the Delhi Police has said.

The charge-sheet has been filed under sections 147, 148, 149, 186, 353, 332, 307, 323, 427, 436, 109/120B/34 of the IPC read with sections 27, 25 of Arms Act in Jahangirpuri police station.

The investigation of the case was transferred to the Delhi Police Crime Branch on April 18. After a thorough probe, the Crime Branch filed the charge-sheet comprising 2063 pages.

Thirty-seven accused persons have been arrested by the Delhi Police in connection with the CAA and NRC protests while eight accused persons are still absconding against whom proceeding under section 82 of the CrPC is underway.

The charge-sheet says that total nine firearms, five live cartridges, two empty cartridges, nine swords and clothes of 11 accused persons worn at the time of incident and seen in videos were recovered.

“CCTV footage of 28 cameras of PWD installed around Kusal Cinema Road, 30 cameras of PWD installed around C-Block, Jahangirpuri, were obtained and analysed which helped the police in arresting the accused. Apart from this, 34 viral videos and 56 videos from electronic media were collected and analysed. Twenty out of 37 accused persons arrested were captured in CCTV footage and viral videos. Face identification technology was taken for the identification of the accused persons,” the charge-sheet added.

The Delhi Police said that 21 mobile phones were seized from accused persons and 132 witnesses were examined out, of which 85 were police and 47 were public persons, doctors, among others.

Police incident report against two juveniles were already filed before the Principal JJ Board.

A total number of 13 police teams were deployed for verifying background details of the accused persons, dump data, technical (FRS) analyses, viral video collections, CCTV footage collection in arrest of accused persons, financial aspect and conspiracy angles etc.

“Sanwar Kalia, Saddam Khan, Salman alias Suleman, Ashanoor, Ishrafil, Jahangir, Hasmat alias Asmat and Sheikh Sikander,” are absconding in the matter.— IANS