new delhi long before several parts of the country erupted in protest against citizenship amendment act caa in december a lone figure went around several areas in delhi pamphlets in hand raising awareness against the proposed law and when women of shaheen bagh began a peaceful protest against caa and national register of citizens sharjeel imam was at times introduced as the one who was instrumental in mobilising themapart from the demonstrators and journalists who frequented the area the 31yearold phd scholar at jawaharlal nehru university jnu was hardly a recognisable namebut by monday police in five states were on the hunt for imam his pictures splashed across newspapers as delhi chief minister arvind kejriwal and union home minister amit shah traded barbs over him the computer science graduate from indian institute of technology bombay was charged with sedition after his speech at aligarh muslim university amu earlier allegedly suggesting cutting off assam and the northeast from india went viralimam was picked up from jehanabad bihar the district he grew up in on tuesday to be flown to new delhi for questioning while imam wrote on twitter that he had surrendered delhi police maintained that he was arrested in a letter his mother afshan rahim alleged harassment by police and the authorities she said imam was being victimised for a statement that had been twisted and taken out of context by the mediain the speech made at amu on january 16 imam was heard drawing attention to the plight of muslims in assam who were being sent to detention centres he also said that to help assam they would have to block the way for the army as well as block supplies he later clarified to newspapers that he had been calling for a chakka jam to draw the governments attention to the grievances of protesters on facebook several of his posts sought a chakka jam he maintained that the protests should be nonviolentbut even before imam who completed part of his schooling at st xaviers high school patna and went on to study at delhi public school vasant kunj became a strong voice of opposition to caa he had written about discrimination against muslims a year after the disappearance of jnu student najeeb ahmed in 2016 with whom imam shared his hostel wing he had written about prejudices against muslims and how his twoyear tryst in the corporate world had left him disenchantedafter graduating from iitb in 2011 imam spent two years in a software company in bengaluru before joining jnus centre for historical research in 2013 choosing to do his thesis on late colonial muslim politics in south asia umar khalid and anirban bhattacharya who were charged with sedition in 2016 are also alumni of chsat jnu imams seniors told toi that he was academically good he was initially with the left but disassociated himself due to political differences said a senioranother close friend said imam is vocal about his ideas and an open critic of