Around 22 people present at the flashpoint JNU event, including some outsiders, have been identified after the joint interrogation of JNUSU president Kanhaiya Kumar, Umar Khalid and Anirban Bhattacharya conducted at a south Delhi police station today.
"We have ascertained the identities of around 22 persons who were present in the crowd raising seditious slogans. We are likely to question them in the coming days," a police source, said adding that further details about the identified persons are yet to be verified.
He further said the police have so far been unable to identify four persons who had covered their faces with mufflers -- all believed to be outsiders -- who were spotted allegedly raising anti-national slogans at the event.
The investigators are now awaiting the report of JNU high level committee's report on the matter which will be the deciding factor whether the varsity's Vice-Chancellor, who had withdrawn permission for the February 9 event, or other members of the committee will be listed as witnesses in the case, the source said.
Meanwhile, the police have started preparing the evidence file of the case.
The file includes the raw version of the video clip obtained from a news channel on the basis of which the case was registered, the letters of communication between the police and the University authorities and the poster of the event, which the police claim will help prove criminal conspiracy in connection with the matter, the source said.
There are hardly a few unclear points left after the joint interrogation today, the source said.
The ones who had published the posters for the event and distributed them will be considered the "main organisers", the source said, adding that the documents will soon be sent to a forensic laboratory.
(Reopens DEL 43)
Kumar was today sent back to Tihar jail by a Delhi Court on completion of a day's police remand which was sought to interrogate him with Khalid and Bhattacharya.
The court had yesterday sent Kumar to one day police custody after the prosecution said that he was needed to be confronted with Khalid and Bhattacharya in view of discrepancies in their statements regarding the controversial JNU event.
All three of them were interrogated together for the first time at R K Puram police station, from where Kumar was taken away for Tihar around 4.20 PM.
The accused were subjected to two rounds of questioning, with Kumar being confronted with the two separately in the first round and together in the second, a police source said.
The police source claimed that Kumar has so far maintained that on February 9, he came out of his room only when he got to know about a possible confrontation between two groups over the event inside the campus and has dissociated himself with the event.
While Khalid has so far denied having indulged in any anti-national sloganeering, Bhattacharya challenged claims that the slogans mentioned by police were anti-national in nature.
While Kumar was arrested on February 12 and sent to judicial custody five days later, Khalid and Bhattacharya surrendered before police on Monday, a day after they resurfaced at the varsity's campus.
All three of them were arrested in a case of sedition and criminal conspiracy registered over the controversial JNU event against the hanging of Parliament attack convict Afzal Guru, in which anti-national slogans were allegedly raised.
