ED files charge sheet against Kashmiri separatist leader Shabir Shah’s wife Bilquis

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, Sep 17

The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Thursday said that it had filed a supplementary prosecution complaint (equivalent to police charge sheet) under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) against Bilquies Shah, wife of separatist leader Shabir Ahmad Shah, in Patiala House Court here in a terror funding case.

Officials in the ED said the move was an addition to an earlier prosecution complaint filed against Shabir Ahmad Shah and Mohammad Aslam Wani on September 23, 2017.

In the fresh complaint, Bilquies Shah has been accused for her role in the commission of offence of money laundering in terms of Section 3 of the PMLA, they said.

The probe agency had attached the ‘proceeds of crime’ in the form of property, located in the posh area of Srinagar belonging to Shabir Ahmad Shah, which was held in the name of his wife and daughters.

Shah was found to be carrying out illegal activities along with his accomplice Mohammad Aslam Wani, who was an activist of banned militant organisation Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM), the ED officials alleged.

“Investigation under the PMLA revealed that Shabir Ahmad Shah, without having any legitimate sources of income, had received money for carrying out separatist activities in Jammu and Kashmir and had acquired various properties through a maze of dubious transactions,” a senior ED official said quoting the prosecution complaint.

The ED investigation under the PMLA is based on the charge sheet filed by the Delhi Police Special Cell in 2005 under various sections of the IPC – Explosive Substance Act, Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act and Arms Act – against Aslam Wani, who was apprehended with 5 kg of explosive, one pistol with 15 live cartridges and a cash of Rs 62,96,000, the agency has alleged in its prosecution complain.