The Centre on Saturday extended the ban on the Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front for another five years, Union Home Minister Amit Shah said on Saturday.
The Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front is a separatist organisation led by Yasin Malik, who is imprisoned in Delhi’s Tihar Jail.
The organisation was banned under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act in March 2019 in the run-up to the abrogation of Jammu and Kashmir’s special constitutional status under Article 370 of the Indian Constitution.
On Saturday, Home Minister Amit Shah said that the outfit continues to engage in activities that foment terror and secessionism in Jammu and Kashmir. “Anyone found challenging the security, sovereignty and integrity of the nation will face harsh legal consequences,” he said in a post on X.
The home ministry also banned four factions of the Jammu and Kashmir Peoples League – JKPL (Mukhtar Ahmed Waza), JKPL (Bashir Ahmad Tota), JKPL (Ghulam Mohammad Khan) and JKPL (Aziz Sheikh) led by Yaqoob Sheikh – under the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act.
The Centre said that these outfits threatened India's integrity by promoting, aiding and abetting the secession of Jammu and Kashmir through terrorism.
On Wednesday, the government set up a tribunal headed by a Delhi High Court judge Navin Chawla to assess whether there were sufficient grounds to continue the ban on the Jamaat-e-Islami Jammu and Kashmir, which was designated as an unlawful organisation in February 2019.
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