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On Monday, January 6, 2020, the Lucknow Bench of the Allahabad High Court posted the Habeas Corpus petition in the case of senior lawyer and Rihai Manch President Mohammed Shoaib, for next week at the request of the Uttar Pradesh government, Live Law reported.
The bench of Justices Shabihul Hasnain and Virendra Kumar – II, granted the State a week’s time to file a counter affidavit. Mohammed Shoaib’s lawyer AB Solomon and Gaurav Kumar Kashyap who have alleged that since his arrest on the midnight of December 19, 2019, his whereabouts are unknown and that he was not produced before a Magistrate as per the law.
Advocate AB Solomon had in his petition said that Advocate Shoaib was kept under house arrest since 5:30 P.M. on December 18, 2019 without any formal order for the same after he was issued an order under Section 149 CrPC restraining him from participating in the ongoing protests.
He also said that on December 17, 2019 a show cause notice was issued to Adv. Shoaib under sections 107 and 116 of the CrPC and he was directed to furnish a bond of Rs. 50,000 for keeping peace. The hearing was then posted for December 23.
The petition also stated that the counter filed by the State wrongly showed the arrest to have been taken place from Clarks Awadh Tiraha at 8:45 A.M. on December 20 saying that this couldn’t have been the case if Adv. Shoaib was under house arrest. Shoaib’s lawyers also said that the arrest memo had not been signed by the SP and that the collective remand order under Section 167 of the CrPC was against 36 persons and did not explicitly name Adv. Shoaib.
The Court had heard the matter on January 2 and January 3 and asked the state counsel to produce evidence on two matters – one, regarding Adv. Shoaibs arrest from Clarks Awadh Tiraha by producing CCTV footage and two, video footage of him being produced in a civil court by the Lucknow police.
Under the aegis of Mohammed Shoaib, the Rihai Manch, of which he is the President, works towards the release and rehabilitation of people who are falsely implicated in cases of terrorism. The Rihai Manch has also been an active part of the ongoing protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) and National Register of Citizens (NRC) in the country. The Uttar Pradesh police had also arrested some members of the Rihai Manch for allegedly fomenting violence during the anti-CAA protests.
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