PANCHKULA & NEW DELHI : The National Investigation Agency on Monday filed a chargesheet in the Pathankot airbase attack case, naming Jaish-e-Mohammed chief Masood Azhar, his brother Mufti Abdul Rauf Asghar and two other Jaish commanders — Kashif Jan and Shahid Latif — as the accused.
According to sources, the 101-page chargesheet filed at the Panchkula special court states that immediately after the attack, Rauf had posted a video message claiming responsibility for the terror strike in Punjab and glorifying the role of his brother Azhar in the attack that killed seven soldiers. Azhar, who has been named the key conspirator, was released from an Indian jail in exchange for passengers of a hijacked Indian Airlines plane in 1999.
The four accused have been charged under various sections of the Indian Penal Code, Arms Act, Explosive Substances Act and the Prevention of Damage to Public Property Act.
Sources said that evidence listed in the chargesheet includes footprints of a terrorist obtained from Bamiyal village, via which the attackers were believed to have sneaked in, and DNA samples from a soft drink can that was found in the hijacked car of suspended SSP Salwinder Singh.
NIA boss Sharad Kumar claimed that the agency had collected irrefutable evidence against the accused. “It was a very important case and we have collected all evidence to nail JeM terrorists and their chief. Our team has done a scientific investigation in the case and we have technical, physical, digital and documentary evidence to prove their guilt,” he said.
Six protected persons, a jailed terrorist and officials of the FBI and the US Department of Justice figure as witnesses in the chargesheet. Among the witnesses are Mohammed Sadeek, a resident of Ghalotiakalan in Pakistan’s Sialkot district, and Abdul Rahman Mogul, a resident of Polas village in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir’s Poonch district, who had helped in identifying voices and a couple of bodies of the slain terrorists. The four terrorists killed were Nasir Hussain, Hafiz Abu Bakar, Umar Farooq and Abdul Qayum — all residents of Punjab and Sindh provinces.
The government had allowed a Pakistani team of investigators to inspect the airbase, drawing criticism from the Opposition. And the Pakistani team, upon their return, claimed that India neither shared much evidence nor allowed it to interrogate the security personnel who battled the terrorists. No arrests have yet been made over the attack. Pakistan banned Jaish in 2002, a year after the Parliament attack in New Delhi. The country had arrested Azhar in the wake of the 26/11 attacks but released him later.