Separatist leader Yasin Malik appears virtually from Tihar Jail in Delhi HC in terror funding case
JKLF Chief Yasin Malik. (Photo Credit: PTI/File)
The Delhi High Court had allowed the plea of the Tihar Jail, which moved the application after Yasin Malik reached the Supreme Court on July 21 without any court order, seeking permission from the court to produce him virtually in view of an order by the President directing that the separatist leader cannot be “moved from the Tihar Jail”.
New Delhi: Kashmiri separatist leader Yasin Malik on Wednesday appeared before the Delhi High Court virtually in a terror funding case in which the National Investigation Agency (NIA) has sought death penalty for him.
Malik, who is the chief of the Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF), is serving life sentence in the Tihar jail in terror funding case.
Malik was produced before the High Court virtually following a modification of an order of the High Court on the plea of Tihar Jail.
The High Court had allowed the plea of the Tihar Jail seeking permission from the court to produce him virtually in view of an order by the President directing that the separatist leader cannot be “moved from the Tihar Jail”.
“In view of the matter, the order dated May 29, 2023 is necessarily modified to the extent that the jail superintendent is directed to produce Yasin Malik in the present appeal through video conferencing alone on August 9 and not in person,” the High Court said in its modified order.
Earlier, the High Court had on May 29 issued warrants for production of the Kashmiri separatist leader on August 9.
Tihar Jail had moved the application in the High Court following a misunderstanding on the part of the Jail officials, leading to the separatist leader reaching the Supreme Court on July 21 without any court order to appear personally in a case related to the kidnapping of Rubaiya Sayeed, the daughter of then Union home minister Mufti Mohammad Sayeed, in 1989.
The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) has challenged a Jammu court order in the Supreme Court in which the Jammu court allowed the separatist leader to appear in court in person and cross-examine the witnesses in the 1989 Rubaiya Sayeed kidnapping case.
Malik’s presence in the Supreme Court created flutter and led to Solicitor General of India to flag the serious security lapse issue to Union Home Secretary Ajay Kumar Bhalla.Tihar jail had also suspended four of its officers finding the lapse on the part of the jail officials.