NIA gets 10-day custody of 7 Hurriyat leaders: 10 Developments

India Today on May 16 had aired clinching evidence of Pakistan's state and non-state actors, including Hafiz Saeed, choreographing anarchy through their agents in the Kashmir Valley.

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NIA gets 10-day custody of 7 Hurriyat leaders: 10 Developments
Bitta Karate.

All seven Hurriyat leaders, who were arrested on Monday for funding Kashmir unrest, were produced before a Delhi court today where the National Investigation Agency (NIA) got 10 days of custody to probe the money trail.

The arrested include Altaf Ahmad Shah, son-in-law of hardline separatist leader Syed Ali Shah Geelani, and Ayaz Akbar, spokesman of the Geelani-led Hurriyat group.

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The other arrested separatists include Farooq Ahmad Dar alias Bitta Karate, Shahid-ul-Islam, spokesman of the moderate Hurriyat Conference led by Mirwaiz Umer Farooq, Naeem Khan (of the Hurriyat's Geelani faction), Peer Saifullah and Mehrajuddin Kalwal.The next hearing of the case is on August 4.

10 DEVELOPMENTS:
  1. The protest shutdown was called after the National Investigation Agency (NIA) arrested several separatist leaders in the terror funding case on Monday.
  2. Sources said the next course of action will be to send notices to separatist leaders Syed Ali Shah Geelani, Mirwaiz Umar Farooq and Yasin Malik.
  3. Authorities in Jammu and Kashmir today imposed restrictions in parts of Srinagar to prevent separatist-called protests against the arrest made in a terror funding case.
  4. Separatist leaders -- Syed Ali Geelani and Mirwaiz Umer Farooq, who had called for the shutdown were placed under house arrest in Srinagar, while Yasin Malik was lodged in the Srinagar Central Jail.
  5. The District Magistrate has ordered restrictions under section 144 of the CrPC in the old city area including Rainawari, Khanyar, Nowhatta, M.R. Gunj and Safa Kadal.
  6. Public transport, shops, other businesses and educational institutions remained closed here and other district headquarters in the Valley.
  7. Private transport and some three-wheelers were, however, seen moving in uptown and the city outskirts.
  8. Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti is learnt to have batted for separatists saying the state is limping back to normalcy and a delayed action by the agency has helped.
  9. The agency's investigation seeks to identify the chain of players behind the financing of terrorist activities, including pinpointing those who pelted stones at security forces, burnt down schools and damaged government establishments.
  10. Contingents of police and the Central Reserve Police Force in riot gear disallowed vehicular and pedestrian movement in all the areas where restrictions were imposed.

For the the first time since the rise of militancy in Kashmir in the early 1990s, a central probe agency had carried out raids in connection with the funding of separatists.

In 2002, the Income Tax department had raided the establishments of some separatist leaders, including Geelani, and seized cash and documents.

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