In a major relief to senior Samajwadi Party leader Azam, a court in Rampur granted him bail minutes after he was convicted and sent to prison for three years in a hate speech case.
The embattled former Uttar Pradesh minister was also slapped with a fine of ₹25,000 in the hate speech case related to his comments against chief minister Yogi Adityanath in 2019. He was convicted by a special MP-MLA court in the case earlier in the day.
He was charged with making provocative speech by the then-district magistrate.
The Samajwadi Party legislator was convicted under Section 153 (provocative speech) and Section 505 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC), a lawyer associated with the case informed.
He was also convicted on the charge of trying to instigate riots.
While granting him bail, the court granted him one week time to appear before higher courts.
Khan, who was once a powerful political figure in the state, spent several months in jail in a land-grabbing case. He was granted interim bail by the Supreme Court in May this year.
The Supreme Court had criticized the high court for imposing “extreme conditions” on him for bail.
After being convicted in the case for three years, he stands to lose his Assembly membership as per the provisions of the People Representation Act.
(This is a developing story)