Family of Kashmiri Separatist Leader Shabir Shah Seeks His Bail on Medical Grounds, Politicians Join in

New Delhi: With his health reportedly deteriorating, the family of Kashmiri separatist leader Shabir Shah have urged the authorities to grant him bail on medical grounds so that he can receive specialised treatment outside prison.

Shah, who was arrested in 2017 and has since been languishing in Tihar jail on terror funding charges, is suffering from prostate cancer besides other morbidities which need specialised medical treatment, his family has said.

Shah is the third person from a group of separatist leaders and a businessman from Kashmir who were diagnosed with cancer while in prison after their arrest by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) on terror funding charges. 

Earlier, Altaf Ahmad Shah, an associate and son-in-law of the late Hurriyat leader Syed Ali Geelani, and influential Kashmiri businessman Zahoor Ahmad Watali were also diagnosed with renal and prostate cancers, respectively, in jail. While Shah died while serving prison sentences, Watali is serving sentence under house arrest in Delhi owing to his medical condition.

A family source of Shah told The Wire that the septuagenarian separatist leader, who has spent 35 years of life in different prisons of the country, has lost significant weight and doctors have advised “three surgeries” which will require “pre-operative and post-operative care that cannot be adequately provided”, given the limitation of the prison system. 

He said that Shah was admitted to Safdarjung Hospital in the national capital during the second week of June this year where doctors had reportedly planned to operate on him after consultation with the jail authorities, allegedly without his consent or informing his family.

“He is neither at the risk of escape nor a threat to society. These are serious and risky surgeries and we will assume full responsibility for his treatment. Surrounded by his family, he can receive the urgent medical care he requires,” the source said.

He added, “We will plead with the Supreme Court to put him under house arrest on the same lines as (Zahoor Ahmad) Watali and Gautam Navlakha”.

Following the order of a special NIA court in February 2022, Watali was moved out of Tihar jail and put under house arrest to facilitate treatment for his terminal disease while Navlakha was granted permission by the apex court in September 2022 to get treatment at a private hospital.

The Communist Party of India (Marxist) leader, M.Y. Tarigami, on Saturday (June 21) also urged the Union home minister Amit Shah to intervene for a “humane resolution” given Shah’s “advanced age and multiple comorbidities”.

“Pending bail, placing him under house arrest may be considered on humanitarian grounds to ensure he receives adequate care… (and) his family can provide the necessary pre- and post-operative care in a stable and supportive environment,” Tarigami said in a post on X.

He added, “There are precedents of bail being granted in similar medical situations.”

Tarigami is the fourth Kashmir-based leader to have sought bail for Shah who was arrested by J&K Police on the directions of the Enforcement Directorate in 2017 in connection with a 2005 case of money laundering filed by Delhi Police’s Special Cell.

Earlier, moderate Hurriyat chairman Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, former Jammu and Kashmir chief minister Mehbooba Mufti and Peoples Conference chairman Sajad Lone also appealed to the authorities to release Shah from jail and place him under house arrest which could enable his family to stay close to him while he is receiving treatment.

Speaking with The Wire, Mirwaiz said that Shah’s health condition has deteriorated while his family members have not been given permission to speak with him over phone for the past two years.

“At a time when he is facing such a medical emergency and is in dire need of a surgery, denying him bail and proper medical treatment is very unfortunate,” Mirwaiz said while appealing the J&K government to raise the issue with the Union government. 

Shah, who played a crucial role in uniting the two factions of the Hurriyat Conference headed by Geelani and Mirwaiz is the president of the outlawed Democratic Freedom Party (DFP) outfit, an affiliate of the Hurriyat Conference.

Last week, the Delhi high court dismissed Shah's bail application, ruling that he was “conspiring for the secession of Jammu and Kashmir from India.” His counsel had argued that the separatist leader has never been convicted in any case. 

The Enforcement Directorate, which has booked Shah in a case of money laundering, attached his Srinagar residence in 2022 while accusing him of “fuelling unrest in Kashmir valley by way of stone-throwing, processions, protests, bandhs, hartals and other subversive activities.”

“He was involved in receiving funds from terrorist organisation Hizb-ul-Mujahideen (HM) and other terrorists outfits based in Pakistan as well as from the Pakistani establishment through hawala and various other means and channels and these funds were then being used for fuelling and supporting terrorist activities in the Kashmir valley,” the ED had said in a statement.

In 2018, his wife and prominent Srinagar-based gynaecologist, Dr Bilquies Shah, filed a bail application, alleging that her husband was being subjected to “slow poisoning” in Tihar jail.

Described as a ‘Prisoner of Conscience’ by Amnesty International in 1992, Shah has spent more than 39 years in prison as his politics brought him at loggerheads both with the government and even other separatist leaders.

Shah was arrested for the first time in 1968 as a 14-year-old student accused of organising and carrying out a demonstration in Kashmir for the “right of self-determination” for the people.

At the peak of the agitation in Kashmir against the transfer of a tract of land to Amarnath shrine board in 2008, Shah led a march to Muzaffarabad during which moderate Hurriyat leader Sheikh Abdul Aziz was killed in alleged police firing.

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