Day after CBI arrested Kashmiri man in Rubaiya Sayeed’s abduction case, court rejects agency’s remand plea

Shangloo’s counsel Sohail Dar claimed he was not named an accused in the case registered by the CBI, nor did his name figure in the list of accused in a challan presented by the investigating agency in the court. He said that his client was not involved in the case at any stage.

Shangloo later told the media that he had been let off by the court as he was not involved in the case.

The CBI had arrested Shangloo from Srinagar on Monday for allegedly conspiring with the then JKLF chief Yasin Malik in the kidnapping.

The CBI had said in a statement issued on Monday that Shangloo “conspired with Yasin Malik and others in committing a crime” in 1989 and that he was “carrying a reward of Rs. 10 lakhs on his head”.

The CBI had filed a chargesheet against two dozen people in the case related to the abduction of Sayeed. In 2021, the court in Jammu framed charges against 10 persons, including Malik. Two were already dead, and 12, including Shangloo, were absconding, the CBI had said.

On December 8, 1989 — just six days after Mufti Mohammad Sayeed was sworn in as the Union Home Minister by the V P Singh government — Rubaiya was travelling home in a passenger minibus. Then 23, she was interning with the Lal Ded Maternity Hospital in Srinagar and was returning home at Nowgam on the outskirts of Srinagar city. As the minibus reached a few hundred metres away from Mufti’s residence, four gunmen barged inside and abducted her at gunpoint. She was bundled into a waiting Maruti car and shifted to an undisclosed destination.

She was set free on December 13 after the government released five jailed militants.

In January 1999, the then TADA court ordered the release on bail of three accused – Showkat Ahmad Bakhshi, Manzoor Ahmad Sofi and Mohamamd Iqbal Gundroo. The court contended that the accused had been in jail for nine years without trial. By then, Malik was already out on bail.