A special National Investigation Agency (NIA) court in Jammu has sent a letter rogatory (a formal request) to Pakistan for judicial assistance in the collection and transfer of evidences pertaining to the 2019 Pulwama terror attack.
The six-page dossier accessed by HT on Wednesday was issued on November 22, 2022, by third additional sessions judge, Jammu, Ashwani Kumar Sharma, who was designated as a special judge under Section 22 of the NIA Act.
While seeking letter rogatory to Pakistan by special NIA court in his application, public prosecutor of the NIA had recalled the sequence of events that led to the deadly attack on a CRPF convoy on February 14, 2019, at Lethpora in Jammu and Kashmir’s Pulwama, which claimed lives of 40 security personnel.
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The public prosecutor had named Jaish-e-Mohammed chief Maulana Masood Azhar Alvi and other terrorists of the outfit, including Umar Farooq (now dead), Abdul Rouf Asgar, Ammar Alvi, Ashaq Ahmed Nengroo, Mohammad Iqbal Rather, Mohammad Kamran Ali (now dead), Usman Haider, Qari Yasir (now dead), Mohammad Ismail, Sameer Ahmed Dar, Mudasir Ahmed Khan, Sajjad Ahmed Bhat, and Adil Ahmed Dar (who drove the explosive-laden car into the convoy).
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The NIA prosecutor also sought the recording of speech delivered on October 29, 2020, by then Pakistani cabinet minister Fawad Chaudhary, wherein he termed Pulwama attack a “success” on the floor of the assembly.
He also sought details of other terrorists, their handlers and financiers, who conspired to carry out the 2019 attack.
In the application, the prosecutor submitted that the Jaish terrorists, including Umar Farooq, were sent to Afghanistan’s Sangin camp in Helmand province to get training for making explosive devices and learn other tactics of the guerilla warfare in 2016-17.
Farooq had eventually entered Jammu region via International Border in Samba on the intervening night of April 13 and 14 in 2018 and was ferried by local terror associates Ashaq Ahmad Nengroo and Mohammad Iqbal Rather in a truck to Kashmir.
The prosecutor sought to know details of the transactions made to the accounts of Farooq in Allied Bank and Meezan Bank between April 2018 and March 2019 besides information about five Pakistani mobile numbers used by terrorists during conspiracy and execution of the IED attack.
“The application of NIA public prosecutor as is allowed and the competent authority in the Islamic Republic of Pakistan is requested for rendering assistance in the collection of the evidence and further transferring the evidence so collected to the competent authority of Republic of India in the case for commission of offences under sections 16, 18, 20 of UAPA, 1967, and 302, 307 of the IPC and 3 of Explosives Substances Act,” special NIA judge Sharma observed.
