Recently we have been seeing a lot of action by Indian investigative agencies when it comes to investigating Kashmiri separatist leaders for uncovering the funding trail from Pakistan, which is then used to create terror and propagate unrest in the Kashmir Valley.
In the beginning of June, NIA had raided as many as 23 locations across Delhi, Haryana and Kashmir including those of hawala traders and separatists. Residences of prominent separatists like Shahid-ul-Islam, a leader of Awami Action Committee of the All Parties Hurriyat Conference, and of Altaf Fantoosh, who is the son-in-law of Hurriyat leader Syed Ali Shah Geelani were among those raided.
The NIA then proceeded to question and detain Geelani’s son in law along with two other Hurryat leaders.
Now it seems the ED too has got in action after it managed to obtain a non-bailable warrant against separatist Shabir Shah which may result in him getting arrested at the end of the week. This arrest warrant was a result of Shabir Shah not obeying 8 summons issued against him in the last 2 years in connection with him receiving money from Pakistan via hawala channels.
The ED had apparently found in its probe that Shah had acquired properties around Delhi using unaccounted money. Shah has been under the radar after a hawala dealer in 2005 had admitted to be in possession of Rs 63 lakh, which were meant for the separatist leader.
Also a OneIndia report claims that not only separatists, but even journalists and retired judges are being paid money via hawala channels to trigger unrest in Kashmir.
The report claims that the Intelligence Bureau and the CID’s special branch has created a list of 20 individuals, which includes Journalists, a retired High Court Judge, and Jammu & Kashmir officials who get money via hawala channels for spreading the separatist ideology and inciting the youths of the state to take up arms.
An IB official quoted in the report also claims that all the people on the watch list would be acted up by the security agencies. The report also claimed that few journalists were also on the payroll of the ISI to create a pro-azadi narrative about Kashmir.
If true, this could be implementation of Pakistan’s new Kashmir strategy – as highlighted in our report – which called its agents to use media:
Media Coordination Committee with select Journalists as members to “counter Indian propaganda” and specifically promote a media strategy
