‘He said he’d like to share a letter’: When Zohran Mamdani penned a note to Umar Khalid

A photograph of the note was shared on X on Thursday by Khalid’s partner, Banojyotsna Lahiri, the same day Mamdani took office as mayor.

Lahiri said Khalid’s parents, Sahiba Khanam and Syed Qasim Rasool Ilyas, had travelled to the US to visit their daughter ahead of a family wedding. “They met Mamdani in early December, and that’s when he wrote this letter to Umar,” she said.

Speaking to The Indian Express, Ilyas (70), said, “We had met Mr Mamdani on December 9 when we visited the United States to meet our daughter, Umar’s younger sister. We had listened to him read out a letter from Umar’s diary and we wished to meet him. He was kind enough to give us 25 minutes of his time. At the end of the meeting, he said he’d like to share a letter with Umar and wrote a few lines before we left.”

“When Umar came back home to attend his sister’s wedding for a few days, we showed that letter to him,” he added.

Khalid, who has been in jail for six years in connection with the 2020 Northeast Delhi riots, was granted two-week interim bail to attend his sister’s wedding last December. This was his third visit home, as he had been granted interim bail twice earlier.

In 2023, at an event in New York, Mamdani publicly read excerpts from a letter Khalid had written from prison.

Earlier this year, US Congressman James P McGovern also wrote to India’s Ambassador to the US, Vinay Mohan Kwatra, flagging what he described as the “extraordinary length” of pre-trial incarceration in such cases.

In a post on X on December 31, McGovern wrote: “Earlier this month, I met with the parents of Umar Khalid, who has been jailed in India for over 5 years without trial. @RepRaskin & I are leading our colleagues to urge that he be granted bail & a fair, timely trial in accordance with international law.”

Khalid, along with 17 others, is facing allegations of indulging in a “larger conspiracy” to cause the riots in Northeast Delhi between February 23, 2020 and February 25, 2020, which left 53 people dead and over 700 injured. Booked for offences under the Indian Penal Code, Prevention of Damage to Public Property Act, Arms Act and the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, he has been described as a “veteran of sedition” by the Delhi Police Special Cell in its chargesheet.