JNU row: Kejriwal, Rahul, Yechury among 9 booked on sedition charges

New Delhi, Feb 28: Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi and CPI(M) General Secretary Sitaram Yechury are among nine persons who have been booked on sedition charges in connection with the recent row in the Jawaharlal Nehru University, police said on Sunday.

An FIR has been registered against Kejriwal, Rahul, Yechury, senior Congress leaders Anand Sharma and Ajay Maken, CPI leader D Raja and JD(U) Spokesperson KC Tyagi besides JNU Students' Union president Kanhaiya Kumar and the university's research scholar Umar Khalid on the order of a court here, based on a complaint filed by a lawyer, Janardhan Goud.

"It is a court-referred matter. Following the court's directive, a case under section 124A of the IPC (sedition) has been registered yesterday against nine persons, including Rahul Gandhi, Arvind Kejriwal, Sitaram Yechury, JNUSU president Kanhaiya Kumar and others," PTI quoted Saroornagar Police Station Inspector S Lingaiah as saying on Sunday.

The matter will be heard on March 4.

Goud, in his petition said Rahul and other leaders, despite knowing that Delhi Police had registered a case against Kanhaiya on charge of sedition, visited the JNU campus and supported them, adding it "amounted to sedition".

Kanhaiya and Khalid, who were earlier arrested in Delhi on sedition charge, have also been booked on the same charge.

The lawyer had filed a complaint in the court of Metropolitan Magistrate here on Thursday, seeking its direction to the police to register a case against Kanhaiya and Khalid for allegedly raising slogans backing Afzal Guru and against India in the university campus.

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