On Tuesday, May 28, the Delhi High Court dismissed a plea by former Popular Front of India (PFI) Chairman E Abubacker seeking his release in the UAPA case being probed by the NIA. While denying bail, the court bench of Justices Suresh Kumar Kait and Manoj Jain observed that the target of the banned Islamist organisation Popular Front of India (PFI) was to overthrow the democratically elected government of India and replace the constitution with the Sharia Law.
The court stated that it was obvious who the aim was—Hindu leaders who were to be killed, security forces to be attacked, and a Caliphate to be established by 2047.
“The planning of targeted killing of Hindu leaders and attacking the security forces and establishing Caliphate by 2047 would clearly indicate that the target was to challenge the, ‘unity and sovereignty of India’ and not merely to ‘overthrow the government’. Thus, the objective and manner of achieving the same, both, seem culpable,” the Court said.
The Court observed that PFI had been hosting terror camps, recruiting and radicalizing Muslim youth, and providing firearm training to those who planned to carry out acts of terrorism throughout the nation.
As a result, it was determined that, given the testimony of witnesses who indicted Abubacker, it was impossible to claim that the goal of creating a caliphate and the training were unrelated.
“Such statements also go on to show that objective of such weapon-training was with the idea of overthrowing the democratically elected government to replace the Constitution of India with a Caliphate Shariya Law,” the Court said.
It may be recalled that OpIndia had exclusively reported on PFI “India Vision 2047”, the 8-page PFI document that spoke about teaching a lesson to the “coward Hindus” of India. The 8-page PFI document underlined the PFI goal for the years ahead. In the document named ‘India Vision 2047’, PFI has circulated internally among its cadre that they aim to completely dominate the ‘coward Hindus’ and subjugate them and this goal will be achievable even with 10% of Muslims rallying behind PFI.
Meanwhile, Abubacker was arrested by the NIA in 2022 when the anti-terror agency launched a massive crackdown on the banned Islamist. He is currently lodged in judicial custody. Earlier, Abubacker had sought bail on medical grounds from the trial court but his bail was denied. After that, the banned organisation’s former chief sought relief from The High Court but has been denied bail there as well.
A bench of Justices Suresh Kumar Kait and Manoj Jain denied the bail while saying, “We hereby dismiss the appeal.” Abubacker sought his release on both merit as well as medical grounds.
In his plea, Abubacker contended that he was 70 years of age, and a cancer survivor who was battling Parkinson’s disease, and had made several visits to AIIMS during his custody. Thus, he should be granted bail on medical grounds.
However, the anti-terror agency NIA opposed the plea and stated that there were several cases against Abubacker and if released, nobody would depose against him.
The NIA apprehended Abubacker in September 2022 as part of a national operation to crack down against the now-banned organization. The agency charged him with violating the provisions of the Indian Penal Code Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act. The FIR in the case was registered under sections 120B and 153A of the Indian Penal Code, 1860 and section 17, 18, 18B, 20, 22B 38 and 39 of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967.
As per the agency, the PFI, its members and office bearers hatched a criminal conspiracy to raise funds for committing acts of terror across the country and were conducting training camps to indoctrinate and train their cadre for this purpose.
On September 27, 2022, the Ministry of Home Affairs, Government of India banned the Islamist organisation Popular Front of India (PFI) and its associated or affiliated fronts with immediate effect for a period of five years by exercising its powers under sub-section (1) of section 3 of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967 (UAPA).
