Jammu / Srinagar: A day after the Jammu and Kashmir High Court rejected an appeal of Muhammad Yasin Malik, chief of the outlawed Jammu Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF), for transferring his trial in a decades-old case from Jammu to Srinagar, the Congress party on Saturday came out in support of the Kashmiri separatist.
Senior Congress leader PC Chacko said Malik has shown courage to stand up to the Central government. Chacko added that the government was trying to threaten him which should not happen in a democracy.
“Even though we do not support Yasin Malik's ideology or actions, the courage he has shown is something which should be appreciated because New Delhi cannot threaten anybody, India is a democracy,” the Congress leader said.
Chacko alleged that the Narendra Modi government was trying the get Malik surrender at gunpoint.
“If Pragya Singh Thakur, a convicted person, an accused person, can contest an election, and in the name of separatism, Delhi is asking him (Yasin Malik) at gunpoint to surrender, anyone with self-respect will react the way Mr Yasin Malik did,” he alleged.
Malik is currently in judicial custody till May 24 in connection with a terror funding case. He is also being probed by the Central Bureau of Investigation in connection with a case related to the abduction of Rubaiya Saeed, daughter of former J&K CM Mufti Mohammed Sayeed, in 1989.
Further, Malik is on trial in connection with the death of four Indian Air Force personnel in 1990.
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