A special NIA court in Delhi handed concurrent life terms to Kashmiri separatist and JKLF chief Yasin Malik for funding terror in J&K and waging war against the state, rejecting his contention that he had adhered to the Gandhian principle of non-violence and spearheaded "a peaceful struggle" since giving up armed militancy in 1994.
"The convict may have given up the gun, but he never expressed any regret for the violence he committed prior to the year 1994," special judge Parveen Singh said in his 20-page order. "When he claimed to have given up the path of violence after 1994, the government of India took it at face value and gave him an opportunity to reform, and, in good faith, tried to engage in a meaningful dialogue with him, and, as admitted by him, gave him every platform to express his opinion."
Malik betrayed "the good intentions of the government" and "took a different path to orchestrate violence in the guise of political struggle", the special judge said, mentioning how funds mobilised by the JKLF chairman "were used to create unrest" in the form of "paid terror activities of stone-pelting and arson on a mass scale. Therefore, in my considered opinion, it is high time that it is recognised that terror funding is one of the gravest offences and has to be punished more severely," the judge observed.
Former NIA DG Sharad Kumar, during whose tenure the cases were investigated, said the sentence is a landmark as it hands life imprisonment to a terror mastermind and conspirator who, rather than directly committing a terror act, was instigating others to commit it with funds and resources arranged by him and others.“The big fish have finally landed in the net,” he said.
Referring to the prosecution's case for the death penalty to the 56-year-old on grounds of his alleged role in the "genocide and exodus of Kashmiri Pandits", Singh said the issue "is neither before this court, nor has been adjudicated upon and thus the court cannot allow itself to be swayed by this argument". He also mentioned that the crime for which Malik had been convicted didn't fall in the realm of "rarest of rare", as outlined by the Supreme Court, and hence this wasn't a fit case for the capital punishment. The court chose the maximum sentence of life imprisonment for Malik under Section 17 of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, noting that "financing is the backbone of any operation, including terrorist activities". The court handed him a concurrent life term under Section 121 (waging war against the state) of the IPC. Malik had pleaded guilty to all charges and was convicted.
