Srinagar, Nov 23: Kashmiri journalist and editor of The Kashmir Walla magazine Fahad Shah, who was granted bail by Jammu and Kashmir high court last week, has been released from jail after 21 months.
Shah was released from Kot Balwal jail in Jammu on Wednesday and has reached home in Kashmir, his legal team said on Thursday.
“He was released yesterday after the high court granted him bail in a case filed by the state investigation agency(SIA),” said a member of his legal team.
The SIA of J&K Police had taken custody of Shah in May 2022 into the investigation of the FIR number 01/2022 registered at the Joint Interrogation Centre (JIC), in Jammu, in connection with the publication of an alleged seditious article in now defunct The Kashmir Walla in 2011, allegedly written by a Kashmiri scholar Abdul Aala Fazili. Shah was booked under UAPA.
Shah, 34, was arrested on February 4, 2022 by Pulwama police under the charges of allegedly glorifying militancy and sedition after running a story on an encounter. Besides the SIA case, the police had filed three separate first information reports (FIRs) against Shah in four years – one each in Srinagar, Pulwama and Shopian. The police accused him of glorifying terrorism, spreading fake news and inciting the people of Jammu and Kashmir.
On November 17, the Jammu wing of the high court, comprising justices Anil Sreedharan and ML Manhas, granted him bail in the alleged seditious article case.
In the case, the court quashed charges such as terror conspiracy (Section 18) and waging war against the country (Section 121) of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act and imputations, assertions prejudicial to national-integration (Section 153-B) of the Indian Penal Code.
Shah will, however, face trial under Section 13 (abetting unlawful activities) of the UA(P)A. He will also undergo trial for allegedly receiving foreign funds illegally.
The judgment, while noting the appellant’s assertion that despite being granted bail in Pulwama and Shopian cases, Shah was not released but the alleged article case was dug out from the past.
“However, the appellant was still not released, and his custody was shifted to Safa Kadal police station (in Srinagar) in another case registered at that police station. It is also averred that before the court of competent jurisdiction at Srinagar could decide his bail application, the appellant was taken into preventive detention under the provisions of the Jammu and Kashmir Public Safety Act, 1978. It was in this backdrop that the current case against the appellant was dug out by the Respondent with the registration of the aforementioned FIR,” the court said.
The court said the act (of publication of the article) was allegedly done 11 years ago. “From then till date, no evidence has been brought on record that the offending article was responsible in provoking persons to take to militancy. Not a single witness says this,” it said.
While also putting the side of the state on record, the court said that the prosecution alleged that the appellant is part of an “operation to build and propagate the false narrative that is essential to sustain the secessionist cum terrorist campaign, the aim of which is to break the Indian union, secession of Jammu and Kashmir from India and accession to Pakistan reported Hindustan Times.
