Delhi’s Patiala House Court has granted interim bail till October 2 to Sheikh Rashid alias Engineer Rashid, MP from Baramulla, Jammu and Kashmir, in the terror funding case. Rashid was arrested by the NIA in 2017 under UAPA in a terror funding case. After this, Rashid has been lodged in Tihar Jail in Delhi since 2019. Rashid had approached the court seeking interim bail to campaign in the upcoming Jammu and Kashmir Assembly elections to be held on September 18, September 25 and October 1. Rashid’s brother Khurshid Ahmed Sheikh is contesting from Langate seat.
It is worth noting that his name came up during the investigation of Kashmiri businessman Zahoor Watali who was arrested by the NIA for allegedly funding terrorist groups and separatists in Kashmir. The NIA had filed a chargesheet in this case against many people including Kashmiri separatist leader Yasin Malik, Lashkar-e-Taiba founder Hafiz Saeed and Hizbul Mujahideen chief Syed Salahuddin. Yasin Malik was sentenced to life imprisonment by a trial court in 2022 after being convicted of the charges.
Rashid won the Lok Sabha election
Engineer Rashid won the Baramulla Lok Sabha seat in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections. He defeated former Chief Minister and National Conference (NC) Vice President Omar Abdullah. At the same time, he won from Langate assembly constituency in the 2008 and 2014 Jammu and Kashmir elections. However, he failed in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. Rashid leads the Awami Ittehad Party (AIP) but he contested this election as an independent.
AIP is BJP’s ‘proxy’- Mehbooba Mufti
Meanwhile, People’s Democratic Party (PDP) chief Mehbooba Mufti on Monday targeted Rashid’s party AIP, calling it a ‘proxy’ of the BJP. Mehbooba said, ‘I want to know why Rashid is in jail… It took 50 years for Mohammad Saeed Mufti to form the PDP, we still do not have the resources to field candidates everywhere. Who is behind his (Engineer’s) organization, whose candidates are standing everywhere, where is the funding coming from? Where are they getting so much courage to do hooliganism?’ PTI had quoted Mufti as saying that PDP candidate from Shopian assembly constituency Yawar Shafi was injured in an alleged attack by AIP workers.