Delhi HC lists Engineer Rashid's bail plea on Feb 24 after SC clarification

The Delhi High Court on Tuesday listed for hearing on February 24 a plea by jailed MP Abdul Rashid Sheikh alias Engineer Rashid on the issue of lack of a forum to decide his bail plea in a terror funding case.

Justice Vikas Mahajan deferred the hearing after he was informed by the counsel for the high court administration that the Supreme Court on Monday clarified that the NIA court dealing with the case could hear the bail plea.

Rashid had moved the high court earlier, alleging he did not have a remedy after the NIA court dealing with his bail application left him in a limbo after his election to the Lok Sabha last year on account of it not being a special MP/MLA court.

As an interim relief, Rashid was on Monday allowed a two-day custody parole to attend the ongoing Parliament session on February 11 and 13.

In view of the development in the top court, Justice Mahajan on Tuesday orally asked Rashid's lawyer to approach the NIA court for bail.

The MP's counsel, however, urged the court to adjourn the matter for a week.

Adjourning the matter, it asked the high court administration's lawyer to place on record the office order which would be passed by the authorities on the issue of designation of the court to hear Rashid's case in view of the Supreme Court's clarification.

The Baramulla MP is facing trial in a terror funding case with the allegations that he funded separatists and terror groups in Jammu and Kashmir.

Rashid, who was elected from the Baramulla constituency in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, has been lodged in Tihar Jail since 2019 after the NIA arrested him under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act in the 2017 terror-funding case.

The Delhi High Court registrar general had moved the top court earlier over the issue of jurisdiction of the court which should ideally hear Rashid's bail plea.

The clarification from the Supreme Court was required as a 2016 judgment of the apex court designated a special MP/MLA court to solely try cases involving MP/MLAs.

In his petition, Rashid urged the high court to either direct the expeditious disposal of his pending bail plea by the NIA court or decide the matter itself.

On December 24 last year, Additional Sessions Judge Chander Jit Singh, who requested the district judge to transfer the case to a court designated to try lawmakers, dismissed his plea asking for an order on the pending bail application in the NIA case.

With the matter sent back to him by the district judge, the trial judge said in his decision that he could only decide the miscellaneous application and not the bail plea.