40 terrorists shifted out of Srinagar Jail

SEPARATISTS PROTEST Move follows probe into the escape of Lashkar militant from police custody recently

As many as 40 terrorists and their sympathisers, including Pakistani national Zia Mustafa, involved in the 2003 Nadimarg massacre of Kashmiri Pandits were shifted on Tuesday from the central jail here to prisons outside the Valley, a step taken after the escape of LeT’s Mohammed Naveed Jhatt from a hospital earlier this month.

The Jammu & Kashmir prison department chalked out a list of these terrorists and sympathisers in the central jail and immediately a movement order for shifting them was initiated, officials said here.

Three Pakistani terrorists including Mustafa, who was accused of killing 24 Kashmiri Pandits at Nadimarg in 2003, were among those shifted to various jails outside the Kashmir valley, they said.

The state home department, which had ignored earlier requests for shifting of these prisoners, took the decision after an internal enquiry pointed out about a “casual approach” being adopted by the department.

The Union home ministry had also directed it to fully review security measures in place in jails and transportation of inmates.

Among other prisoners shifted to district prison in Jammu were overground worker of Lashker-eTaiba Ashfaq Ahmad Bhat, a terrorist of the same group Mohammad Aslam Malik, dreaded Hizbul Mujahideen terrorist Amir Nahi Wagey and another Pakistani terrorist Abdul Razak Baloch, who used to act as a guide in ferrying terrorist groups in Kupwara.

Shifting of hardened prisoners came after the escape of Jhatt, who was lodged in Srinagar central jail. He fled from a hospital in the city after he and his accomplice shot and killed two policemen accompanying him.

HARDLINERS ALLEGE POLITICAL VENDETTA

Separatists on Tuesday held a protest against shifting of ‘political prisoners’ outside the Kashmir valley.

Dozens of people including Jammu & Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF) chairman Yasin Malik gathered outside Jama Masjid for a sit-in highlighting the plight of Kashmiri political prisoners in different jails in and outside the state.

Malik led the protest while Syed Ali Geelani and Mirwaiz Umar Farooq addressed the gathering via telephone, a joint statement of the three leaders said.