by admin | May 25, 2021 | News, Politics
New Delhi : A chargesheet against seven Kashmiri separatists and a businessman in a case of funding terror in the Kashmir Valley will be filed by the NIA on Thursday, the day their judicial custody ends, officials said.
According to National Investigation Agency (NIA) sources, the agency will file the chargesheet against the arrested separatist leaders and a businessman under various sections of money laundering and waging war against country as the judicial custody ends on January 18.
A Delhi court on January 12 extended the judicial custody of the eight accused till January 18.
The eight have been charged with receiving funds from Pakistan to sponsor terror activities and stone-pelting in Jammu and Kashmir.
Kashmir was rocked by violent protests after Hizbul Mujahideen militant Burhan Wani was killed in a gunfight with security forces on July 8, 2016.
An official of the agency said that they will be charged under various sections of Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAP Act of 1967) and Indian Penal Code (IPC) including Section 121 Waging, or attempting to wage war against the state and Section 120 B entering into criminal conspiracy.
According to a senior official of the agency, the main chargesheet prepared by the NIA contains close to 50 pages and the annexure attached to the chargesheet, may run into nearly 5,000 pages.
On July 24, 2017, the NIA arrested seven of them — Aftab Hilali Shah alias Shahid-ul-Islam, Ayaz Akbar Khandey, Farooq Ahmad Dar alias Bitta Karate, Nayeem Khan, Altaf Ahmad Shah, Raja Mehrajuddin Kalwal and Bashir Ahmad Bhat alias Peer Saifullah — on charges of criminal conspiracy and waging war against India.
Altaf Ahmad Shah is the son-in-law of hardline Hurriyat leader Syed Ali Shah Geelani, who advocates Jammu and Kashmir’s merger with Pakistan. Islam is a close aide of moderate Hurriyat leader Mirwaiz Umar Farooq. Khandey is the spokesperson for the Geelani-led Hurriyat.
Businessman Zahoor Ahmad Shah Watali, accused of acting as a conduit for channelling funds for separatists and terror activities in the Kashmir Valley, was arrested on August 17 last year.
He was allegedly collecting funds from Pakistan and banned terrorist organisations and transferring the same to Hurriyat leaders.
Watali is known to be friends with Pakistani leaders as well as separatists, besides leading politicians in Kashmir, the NIA said.
The NIA has filed a case against the separatist leaders on May 30 following a sting operation by a television channel after the Geelani-led Hurriyat suspended Nayeem Khan confessed that Hurriyat leaders had been receiving funds from Pakistan for subversive activities in the Kashmir Valley.
Hafeez Saeed, the Pakistan-based chief of the Jamaat-ul Dawah, the front of the banned Lashker-e-Taiba (LeT), has been named in the FIR as an accused besides organisations such as the Hurriyat Conference (factions led by Geelani and Mirwaiz Farooq), Hizbul Mujahideen (HM) and Dukhtaran-e-Milat.
The NIA had questioned the arrested persons after the May 2017 expose. The counter-terror probe agency had also conducted raids in Srinagar, Jammu, Delhi and Haryana and reportedly seized incriminating evidence against those involved in receiving, acting as intermediaries and final beneficiaries of funds coming from Pakistan.
India has for decades accused Pakistan of arming, financing and training militants fighting to end Indian rule in Jammu and Kashmir. Islamabad says it provides only political and diplomatic support.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | News, Politics
Srinagar : The mother of a Kashmiri businessman arrested in Delhi on terrorism charges on Monday urged Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti to help get her son released, claiming he was innocent.
The businessman’s family members also staged a protest here.
Businessman Bilal Ahmad Kawa was arrested from the Indira Gandhi International Airport in Delhi on January 12 by Delhi Police and the Gujarat Anti-Terrorism Squad for alleged involvement in a 2000 attack on the Red Fort.
Delhi Police said the 37-year-old’s bank account had been used for terror funding in Jammu and Kashmir and elsewhere by the Lashkar-e-Taiba.
Kawa’s mother Fatima told reporters during the protest that her son was a genuine businessman holding an Indian passport issued in 2001.
She insisted that if her son was a militant, she would never seek his release. She asked Mehbooba Mufti to intervene and ensure that her son was not framed.
According to her, Kawa had gone to Delhi for a medical check up. The Jammu and Kashmir Police has said there was no case against him, nor does he figure in any list of terror suspects.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | News, Politics
New Delhi : The NIA on Friday told a court here that it will file next week a chargesheet in the case of terror funding in the Kashmir Valley as a court extended till January 18 the judicial custody of seven Kashmiri separatists and a businessman.
According to court sources, during the in-camera proceedings, the National Investigation Agency told Additional Sessions Judge Tarun Sherawat that the final report in the case will be filed next week.
“The investigation of the case is at concluding stage and the evidence on record is being summed up,” NIA said.
The agency urged the court to extend the judicial custody of the eight accused for another seven days. The court did so, via video conferencing.
The eight have been charged with receiving funds from Pakistan to sponsor terror activities and stone-pelting in Jammu and Kashmir.
On July 24, 2017, the NIA arrested seven of them — Aftab Hilali Shah alias Shahid-ul-Islam, Ayaz Akbar Khandey, Farooq Ahmad Dar alias Bitta Karate, Nayeem Khan, Altaf Ahmad Shah, Raja Mehrajuddin Kalwal and Bashir Ahmad Bhat alias Peer Saifullah — on charges of criminal conspiracy and waging war against India.
Altaf Ahmad Shah is the son-in-law of hardline Hurriyat leader Syed Ali Shah Geelani, who advocates Jammu and Kashmir’s merger with Pakistan. Islam is a close aide of moderate Hurriyat leader Mirwaiz Umar Farooq. Khandey is the spokesperson for the Geelani-led Hurriyat.
Businessman Zahoor Ahmad Shah Watali, accused of acting as a conduit for channelling funds for separatists and terror activities in the Kashmir Valley, was arrested on August 17 last year.
He was allegedly collecting funds from Pakistan and banned terrorist organisations and transferring the same to Hurriyat leaders.
Watali is known to be friends with Pakistani leaders as well as separatists, besides leading politicians in Kashmir, the NIA said.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | News, Politics
COURTESY: TWITTER/J&K PDP
Jammu : Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti’s brother Tassaduq Hussain Mufti was sworn in on Thursday as a Minister in the PDP-BJP coalition government and given the important portfolio of Tourism.
The other Minister sworn in on Thursday, Javaid Mustafa Mir has been allotted relief, rehabilitation, reconstruction and floriculture portfolio.
Abdul Rehman Veeri, state Revenue Minister, has been given additional charge of Hajj and Auqaf department.
Hajj and Auqaf portfolio had fallen vacant after Farooq Andrabi, who held independent charge of the portfolio, resigned from the state council of Ministers to pave way for Tassaduq’s induction.
Earlier, Governor N.N. Vohra administered the oath of office to Tassaduq Mufti and Javaid Mustafa Mir at the Raj Bhawan’s lawn here. Both were sworn in as cabinet ministers.
Tassaduq Mufti, 45, is a trained cinematographer, who earned critical acclaim for his camera work in the Vishal Bhardwaj directorial “Omkara”.
When his father, former Chief Minister Mufti Muhammad Sayeed passed away on January 7, 2016, Tassaduq came back to support his mother and sister.
He was earlier in-charge of the Chief Minister’s Grievance Cell. Prior to his nomination as a member of the upper house of the state’s bicameral legislature, Tassaduq Mufti resigned as head of the cell.
Mir, senior PDP leader and MLA from Chadoora constituency in Badgam district, earlier also served as a cabinet minister in 2015 under the senior Mufti.
He was dropped when Mehbooba Mufti took over the Chief Minister in April 2016.
The Tourism and Culture portfolio was earlier with Mehbooba.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | Business, Corporate, Corporate Governance, Economy, Emerging Businesses, News, Politics, SMEs
Mehbooba Mufti
Jammu : Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti has advocated reopening of ancient trading routes between the state and Central Asian countries, official sources said on Saturday.
This will help the state, which is the gateway to Central Asia, open up to the outside world and its opportunities, she said at the India Ideas Conclave 2017 at Panaji in Goa on Friday evening.
An official statement issued here on Saturday quoted her as saying that re-opening the traditional/historic routes will enable to script a new history.
Mehbooba Mufti said Jammu and Kashmir shoudl be made a model state with connectivity all across so that it becomes a model for SAARC cooperation in the region.
She also said that the state’s residents ought to be have a sense of belonging because the idea of India is incomplete without the idea of Jammu and Kashmir. “Reconciliation is the way ahead,” she said.
The Chief Minister said that amnesty to Kashmiri youths involved in stone-pelting was aimed at giving them another chance to lead a peaceful life hereafter.
The appointment of an interlocutor by the Centre on Kashmir was a way forward for reconciliation, she said.
“Though both the Peoples Democratic Party and Bharatiya Janata Party had ideological differences on many issues, their alliance is aimed to get Jammu and Kashmir out of uncertainty, and connect state’s people with those in rest of the country.”
On the return of migrant Kashmiri Pandit families to the Valley, the Chief Minister said not only her government, but the whole Kashmiri society wants them back honourably.
She said the government was taking many steps to this end.
The Chief Minister appealed to the media to play a crucial role in bringing people and communities closer.
She said some media houses through irresponsible coverage of incidents ended up creating more discord and acrimony among different people and communities.
—IANS
