Life in Captivity: Umar Khalid’s Experience
Prison is hardest at sunset. As thousands of inmates in Delhi’s most notorious jail are released from their cells and confined to the damp yard until nightfall, prisoner number 626714 experiences a rising sense of dread.
Umar Khalid, the inmate in question, recently found solace in learning that a political prisoner exiled thousands of miles away had described the same feeling over 150 years ago.
“Even Dostoevsky refers to this state of mind at sunset in his prison memoir,”
Khalid said in his first interview since his 2020 incarceration.
“I guess maybe it is because it starts sinking in that another day of your life has been spent in captivity.”
Outside Tihar prison’s walls, Khalid is a well-known figure. He rose to prominence over the past decade, initially as a passionate student activist and later as a leading voice in the anti-government protests of 2019, which marked the first significant challenge to Narendra Modi’s administration. By September 2020, he was arrested and imprisoned on terrorism charges, accused of being a “key conspirator” in deadly religious riots in Delhi and of plotting “violent regime change.”
Television anchors continue to mention his name nightly, branding him a Muslim terrorist and anti-national. Conversely, left-wing activists chant his name at demonstrations and wear T-shirts featuring his image.
For human rights organizations and activists, Khalid symbolizes the suppression of dissent under Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which has governed for 12 years and faces accusations of using the judicial system to target opponents.
Khalid, a Muslim and left-wing rights advocate, is a vocal critic of the BJP’s Hindu nationalist agenda, which aims to transform India from a secular state into a Hindu nation. He has accused the Modi government of exacerbating the marginalization of the country’s 200 million Muslims and other minorities. The BJP has consistently denied allegations of religious discrimination.
International human rights groups have widely condemned Khalid’s nearly six years in jail without trial as unjust. New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani sent him a handwritten note expressing solidarity, which elicited a strong reaction from the Indian government. The BJP maintains that India’s judiciary operates independently and that Khalid’s prosecution is unrelated to politics.
Due to incarceration conditions, conducted the interview through family and friends, with questions and answers relayed indirectly.
After years of denying allegations and contending with a propaganda campaign beyond his control, the 38-year-old admits it has been difficult to maintain his composure.
“When you are reduced to just an image, either negative or positive, it becomes difficult to maintain not just your humanity but even your sanity at times,”
he said.
“Even those who sympathise with you, or portray you as someone larger than yourself, forget that I am a human being with my own share of vulnerabilities, fears and imperfections. And that these long years in prison have wreaked havoc on my mind and body and exacerbated all these anxieties within me.”
Despite his imprisonment, Khalid’s stance against the Modi government remains firm. As Hindu nationalism has become the dominant political force in India, he expresses alarm at the “normalisation and glorification of hate speech and genocidal language.”
He stated,
“the process of India becoming a post-truth society is near complete.”
The interview avoided discussion of his legal case or prison conditions, but Khalid emphasized that silence is not an option.
“You even hear murmurs about yourself from fellow prisoners you shared meals with, calling you a terrorist behind your back. This propaganda dehumanises me in people’s eyes,”
he said.
“Humanity is a privilege that is not granted to people like me.”
‘Silence Emboldens This Regime’
Raised in the Muslim-majority area of Jamia Nagar in southeast Delhi, Khalid witnessed firsthand how Hindu nationalist politics fractured society along religious lines and deprived Muslims of rights and dignity.
“I grew up in a Muslim ghetto at a time when Muslims were increasingly oppressed, marginalised and demonised,”
he said.
“For any sensitive person, it is simply not possible to remain unaffected by all these developments.”
While pursuing his PhD at Delhi’s Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), Khalid engaged deeply in student politics. His prominence grew as JNU became targeted by right-wing ideologues aiming to dismantle a university long regarded as a bastion of left-wing activism, intellectualism, and debate.
Following his participation in a political event at JNU in 2016, Khalid was arrested on sedition charges amid media campaigns branding him an “anti-national” threat. He said,
“my life was never the same”from that moment. The university attempted to block his PhD thesis submission, which he successfully challenged in the high court. His thesis, Fractured Communities, is scheduled for publication this month.
Khalid’s confrontation with the BJP government peaked in 2019 after the passage of the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), perceived as discriminatory against Muslims. JNU became a hub for protests against the law. Hundreds of thousands marched across Indian cities and towns in one of the first major challenges to Modi’s regime.
Khalid was a central figure in the movement. In a notable speech, he said,
“We won’t respond to violence with violence. We won’t respond to hate with hate. If they spread hate, we will respond to it with love.”
The state responded harshly. Protests were met with lethal police force, and BJP leaders issued inflammatory anti-Muslim rhetoric. Rising tensions culminated in sectarian riots in Delhi in February 2020. Fueled by online misinformation, Hindu mobs attacked areas of the capital, targeting Muslims and those with Muslim names or circumcised. Some Muslims retaliated.
The violence lasted three days, resulting in 53 deaths, mostly Muslims. However, Delhi police charge sheets did not accuse BJP figures and named few Hindu rioters. Instead, Khalid, who was 1,000 miles away at the time, was accused of “masterminding” the riots.
He and over a dozen other prominent human rights defenders and student activists were charged with “engineering communal riots” to coordinate a “pre-planned attack on the nation” through “armed rebellion.”
Khalid described the charges as
“dystopian”. Seven months later, police arrived at his family home in Delhi to arrest him under India’s stringent terrorism laws, alongside other serious charges. Since then, Delhi police have faced allegations of fabricating evidence and forging witness statements in multiple riot cases, allegations they have not addressed.
While others named in the case have been granted bail, Khalid’s bail applications have been repeatedly denied, delayed, or adjourned by judges, some of whom have recused themselves. The BJP denies political interference but has publicly welcomed the rejection of his bail requests.
The repeated denial of freedom has been
“quite heartbreaking,”Khalid said.
“Slowly hope started dying out. And without having hope to hang on to, surviving prison becomes exceptionally difficult – it takes a huge toll on you emotionally, mentally, and physically.”
He remains imprisoned as the police investigation continues indefinitely, with no trial date set.
Khalid expresses frustration at the failure of the shrinking opposition to Modi to defend political prisoners’ rights. Some, including the late student leader Kanhaiya Kumar, have died behind bars.
“Six years down the line, I must say that I am really disappointed and even feel isolated,”
he said.
“This silence – of opposition parties, of civil society groups, of celebrity activists who have made a career out of piggy-backing on people’s movements – emboldens this regime to go after further dissidents.”
At night, Khalid finds some peace. Once back in his cell and after the warden’s keys jangle fades, he finds solace in words scribbled on his wall—quotes from his journal writings. Next to a picture of anti-colonial revolutionary Bhagat Singh, Khalid has written his famous words:
“I am that mad soul who is free even in captivity.”
