Advocate Vrinda Grover has said that “Free Umar Khalid” is a valid statement for anyone who understands the Constitution and believes in Indian democracy, arguing that the student activist has spent six years in pre-trial custody under the UAPA in the 2020 Delhi riots case, and pointing to a conflict between Supreme Court benches on bail.
New Delhi: Senior Advocate Vrinda Grover has said that raising the slogan “Free Umar Khalid” is “a valid statement to be made by any person who understands the Indian Constitution and who believes in Indian democracy,” speaking at an online event marking six years of the activist’s incarceration as an under-trial prisoner in the 2020 North-East Delhi riots “larger conspiracy” case under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA).
The remarks, reported are the views of a Senior Advocate expressed at a public meeting; they are set out here as her opinion. The underlying prosecution is pending, the allegations against the accused are untested, and, as Grover herself noted, the matter remains at the pre-trial stage; nothing has been established against Umar Khalid, who is entitled to the presumption of innocence. LawChakra reports her statements and the connected legal developments without endorsing any political position.
What Grover said
Grover contended that Khalid had been incarcerated for the ideas he holds rather than for any proven act. Speaking at the online meeting, she said that dissent had become difficult to express, and that the criminalisation of a slogan reflected what she described as a “fear of ideas”:
“There can’t be democracy without the exchange of ideas… So, I want to say this very categorically and with full responsibility as somebody who engages with law that ‘Free Umar Khalid’ is a valid statement to be made by any person who understands the Indian Constitution and who believes in Indian democracy.”
She also argued that Khalid’s custody should not be described merely as that of an “under-trial,” since the trial in the case is yet to begin, leaving him, on her characterisation, in prolonged pre-trial detention. These are contested political and legal assertions advanced by Grover; the State’s position in the case, that the accused face serious charges to be tested at trial, is a matter of record in the ongoing proceedings.
The legal core: a conflict between Supreme Court benches on UAPA bail
Beyond the rhetoric, Grover’s remarks touched a genuine and significant fault line in the Supreme Court’s recent bail jurisprudence, one that is on the public record and independent of any political viewpoint. She was critical of the reasoning by which bail had been denied to Khalid on the footing that he was an alleged “ideological driver” of the larger conspiracy, whose role was said to differ from that of co-accused who were granted bail.
The reference is to two lines of Supreme Court authority now in apparent tension. In the Gulfisha Fatima line, a two-judge Bench declined bail to certain accused in the conspiracy case, drawing distinctions based on their alleged roles. Subsequently, in Syed Iftikhar Andrabi v. National Investigation Agency (2026), another two-judge Bench is reported to have disapproved of the Gulfisha Fatima reasoning for diluting the principle laid down by a three-judge Bench in Union of India v. K.A. Najeeb. The K.A. Najeeb principle holds that the stringent statutory bar on bail under the UAPA can “melt down” where there has been a prolonged period of incarceration coupled with the unlikelihood of the trial concluding in the near future, so that the constitutional right to a speedy trial prevails and “bail, not jail” remains the rule even under the UAPA.
Grover pointed to this divergence, that one Bench had effectively questioned the correctness of the approach another Bench had taken, as itself a matter warranting open discussion:
“You have two benches of the Supreme Court, one of which says Gulfisha Fatima’s judgment is incorrect, and the second, which denied them bail. This is a matter of discussion.”
This aspect of her remarks reflects a real and reportable legal controversy: how the “bail is the rule” principle from K.A. Najeeb is to be applied in long-pending UAPA cases, and how coordinate Benches of the Supreme Court are to be reconciled when they appear to differ. That is a question of law that transcends the politics of any particular case.
Her wider argument, and the caveats
Grover situated the case within the broader controversy over the anti-CAA protests, noting that petitions challenging the Citizenship (Amendment) Act remain pending in the Supreme Court, and argued that prolonged pre-trial detention without the testing of evidence should be rejected as a matter of principle. “If you have evidence,” she said of the prosecution, “complete the trial in a fair manner and use the evidence to prosecute the person,” adding that “in a democracy, if you have a view different from the regime, your place is not in jail but in Parliament.”
These are strongly-held opinions on a polarising subject, and they are contested. The prosecution maintains that the accused face grave charges arising from the 2020 violence, and the correctness of the bail orders, the conspiracy allegations, and the constitutional challenge to the CAA are all matters that remain before the courts, to be decided on their merits. LawChakra sets out Grover’s statements as her own assessment and does not adopt them.
Why this matters
Stripped of its political charge, the intervention spotlights a live and important question in Indian criminal law: the tension between the stringent bail regime under special statutes like the UAPA and the fundamental right to a speedy trial under Article 21, especially where an accused has spent years in custody before the trial has even begun. The K.A. Najeeb principle, that constitutional courts retain the power to grant bail where prolonged incarceration coexists with little prospect of an early trial, has become central to how such cases are argued, and the reported friction between the Gulfisha Fatima and Andrabi Benches is a genuine doctrinal development that practitioners and courts will watch closely.
At the same time, the episode reflects the wider, and sharply divided, public debate over dissent, national security, and the use of anti-terror law against activists, a debate in which reasonable people, and different Benches, take opposing views. LawChakra’s purpose in reporting it is to record a prominent lawyer’s public remarks and the legal questions they raise, not to take a side. The case itself remains sub judice; the allegations are untested; and the accused is presumed innocent until the trial, whenever it is held, reaches its conclusion.
Source: Remarks by Advocate Vrinda Grover at an online event marking six years of Umar Khalid’s incarceration, as reported by LiveLaw on September 15, 2026.