Lucknow court signs order to release Siddique Kappan, to walk out of jail soon

A Lucknow sessions judge has signed the order on Wednesday (February 1) to release Kerala journalist Siddique Kappan on bail.

The journalist from Kerala, who was incarcerated for over two years, is likely to walk out on bail tomorrow morning, said Live Law. In December 2022, the Lucknow bench of the Allahabad high court had already granted Kappan bail in a Prevention of Money Laundering Act case brought on him by the Enforcement Directorate (ED).

Kappan was supposed to be freed on January 31 but he had to wait longer because of the Lucknow district court’s lawyers’ strike. This delayed the necessary paperwork required for him to walk out of jail, said news reports.

Kappan was first arrested when he was on his way to Hathras along with three others in Mathura on October 5, 2020. He was charged at that time for trying to cause disturbance in Hathras, where a Dalit girl was gang-raped and murdered. The accused, according to the police, were aiming to undermine local law and order and were active members of the Popular Front of India (PFI), a group that has since been outlawed.

Subsequently, the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, was slapped on him for trying to incite people and cause communal disturbance in the wake of the Hathras gang-rape case. ED later arrested him in connection with the PMLA case. He was granted bail by the Supreme Court in September in the Hathras case. But, the money-laundering case kept him behind bars.

However, on December 2022, the Allahabad court granted him bail.

The delay in him getting out of jail had to do with the authentication of the two sureties of ₹1 lakh that he was required to submit before he was granted bail. “The high court had granted bail to Kappan on December 23. His two sureties of ₹1 lakh each could not be verified on time,” said Kappan’s attorney Ishan Baghel, explaining the delay.