The National Investigation Agency (NIA) has filed a chargesheet in connection with the April 22 Pahalgam terror attack in the special NIA court in Jammu yesterday. The agency said in a statement that it has chargesheeted seven accused in the case, including the Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) and its affiliate, The Resistance Front (TRF), as a terrorist organisation. The NIA stated that the attack involved religion-based targeted killings carried out by Pakistan-sponsored terrorists and resulted in the deaths of 25 tourists and one local civilian.
The NIA has said in the chargesheet that Lashkar-e-Taiba chief Hafiz Saeed and TRF head Habibullah Malik, also known as Sajid Jatt, were involved in planning and executing the April 22 attack at Baisaran meadows in Pahalgam. Pakistani terrorist handler Sajid Jatt has also been named as an accused in the 1,597-page chargesheet.
The chargesheet identifies three Pakistani terrorists, Faisal Jatt alias Suleman Shah, Habeeb Tahir alias Jibran, and Hamza Afghani, who carried out the killings on religious lines. All three were killed by the security forces during Operation Mahadev at Dachigam near Srinagar on July 29.
The agency has also invoked charges of waging war against India. It also chargesheeted two accused, Parvaiz Ahmad and Bashir Ahmad Jothar, arrested in June for harbouring the terrorists involved in the attack.
The NIA added that further investigation into the case is continuing.
