Assets of banned JeI worth Rs 26 cr sealed in Shopian, 188 more properties under lens

Srinagar: In a major crackdown on the outlawed Jamaat-e-Islami in Jammu and Kashmir, the Union Territory administration has sealed 9 properties of the pro-Pakistan organisation in Shopian valued at Rs 25.88 crore.

The State Investigation Agency (SIA) has also identified as many as 188 of such properties in Srinagar, Anantnag, Kulgam, Shopian, Pulwama, Budgam and Baramulla districts have been valued at “hundreds of crores of rupees,” according to sources.

The District Magistrate of Shopian, in southern Kashmir, Sachin Kumar Vaishya, has proceeded against the JeI under different provisions of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act on the basis of a report submitted by the SIA.

Under different notifications and SROs, the Union and the UT Government have amended the rules, notified certain organisations including JeI as outlawed after a major terror attack in February 2019 and authorised the District Magistrates to take action of seizure and confiscation under the provisions of UAPA and other laws.

Even as the residential houses and other properties of a number of separatists, allegedly involved in terror funding, have been seized, sealed and attached by the NIA, SIA, CBI and Enforcement Directorate in Jammu and Kashmir, it is for the first time that a major crackdown of sealing the properties has been initiated against the JeI.

The SIA, according to official sources, has carried out an extensive exercise and identified nearly 200 immovable properties, including proprietary, State and community land and multi-floor structures acquired in different names by the JeI in the last 30 years. Most of these properties—many used as schools of the banned Falah-e-Aam Trust and other JeI-linked fronts—have been found in the Shopian district where the politico-religious organisation’s foundation was laid by Saad-ud-din Tarbali and Maulana Ghulam Ahmad Ahrar in the year 1942.

Sources said that the SIA had also identified the officials of the J&K Revenue Department, including Tehsildars, Naib Tehsildars and Patwaris, who had helped the JeI functionaries occupy and possess different lands, including g State and community lands, by way of mutations and other entries. However, action against them is still under the Government’s considerations. While many of such officers had retired from service, a number of them are still in service.

Prominent JeI ideologues, Tarbali and Ahrar organised the first Ijtima (conclave) at Badami Bagh Shopian in 1942 well before the first all India Ijtima of Jamaat-e- Islami Hind was held at Pathankot in 1945. JeI as well as its declared guerrilla arm Hizbul Mujahideen got a large number of leaders and cadre from Shopian and its adjoining districts of Pulwama and Kulgam. After 1999, this triangle grew into a stronghold for the JeI and concurrently the Peoples’ Democratic Party (PDP) it supported in several elections.

Everybody, excluding the SIA sleuths, has been barred by way of the DM’s notification on Thursday from entering or using the notified properties in any capacity. Significantly, a number of such properties have been found directly in the name of the JeI functionaries.