For ‘Selling’ MBBS seats, Special Investigation Agency of JK Police files charge-sheet against Hurriyat leader, 8 others

The special investigation agency (SIA) of Jammu and Kashmir Police filed its first charge-sheet against nine people, including a Hurriyat leader, in a case related to “selling” of MBBS seats in Pakistan to Kashmiri students and using the money to support and fund terrorism, officials said on Thursday.

The case was registered by the Counter Intelligence Kashmir (CIK), a branch of the police’s CID, in July last year after receiving information through reliable sources that several unscrupulous people, including some Hurriyat leaders, were hand in glove with some educational consultancies and were “selling” Pakistan-based MBBS seats and seats in other professional courses in colleges and universities.

The CIK, which has been designated as the SIA now, filed its charge-sheet before a court against Mohammad Akbar Bhat alias Zaffar Akbar Bhat, the chairman of Salvation Movement, a constituent of hardline Hurriyat Conference.

Others named in the charge-sheet are Abdul Jabbar, Fatima Shah, Altaf Ahmad Bhat Qazi Yasir, Mohammad Abdullah Shah, Sabzar Ahmad Sheikh, Manzoor Ahmad Shah, Syed Khalid Geelani, and Mohd Iqbal Mir of Mahaz Azadi Front.

During investigation, oral, documentary, and technical evidence was collected and in analysis, it surfaced that MBBS and other professional degree-related seats were preferentially given to those students who were close family members or relatives of killed terrorists, they said.

Evidence also came on record to show that money had been put into channels that ended up supporting programs and projects pertaining to terrorism and separatism, which included the unrest after the killing of Burhan Wani, the poster boy of the banned Hizbul Mujahideen terror group, in 2016.

The money was also used in failed efforts to disrupt peace after the abrogation of the erstwhile state’s special status in August 2019.