The Supreme Court on March 12, Thursday granted bail to Kashmiri separatist leader Shabir Ahmed Shah in a terror funding case in which he was arrested by the National Investigation Agency(NIA) in June 2019. A bench of Justices Vikram Nath and Sandeep Mehta said a detailed order outlining stringent bail conditions will be issued later.
The court passed the order after hearing rejoinder arguments from Shah’s counsel, senior advocate Colin Gonsalves, while senior advocate Siddharth Luthra represented the NIA. During the hearing, the Bench pointed out several anomalies in the trial proceedings and took note of Shah’s prolonged incarceration.
Earlier, on September 4 last year, the apex court had refused to grant him interim bail and had issued a notice to the NIA seeking its response to his plea challenging a June 12, 2025 order of the Delhi High Court that had denied him relief.
The high court had rejected Shah’s bail plea, observing that the possibility of him engaging in similar unlawful activities and influencing witnesses could not be ruled out. The case dates back to 2017 when the NIA booked 12 individuals on charges of conspiring to raise funds to disrupt peace in Jammu and Kashmir through activities such as stone-pelting, damaging public property and waging war against the central government.
According to the premier investigation agency, Shah allegedly played a significant role in supporting separatist activities in Jammu and Kashmir. This role included inciting people to raise slogans for secession, paying tributes to slain militants, receiving funds through hawala channels and raising money through cross-LoC trade. Investigators alleged that the funds were used to finance subversive and militant activities in the region.
It is, however, not clear whether Shah will be able to come out of prison just yet as there are several other cases also in which he is an accused. On different days, weeks, months and years, Shabir Shah made incendiary statements against the Union of India. He often talked of and preached anti-India policies as also actions which led to a large number of people following him in Jammu & Kashmir Democratic Freedom Party(JKDFP) he had founded.
Born in June 1953, in Anantnag district, Shabir Shah went to the jail for the first time in 1968 and denounced the Sheikh Abdullah-Indira Gandhi accord of 1975. Throughout the past few decades, Shah pursued a pro-Pakistan agenda and was consequently jailed repeatedly. He remained a follower of late SAS Geelani for a long time and was considered an important separatist ideologue.
In late 2004, when several Pakistani journalists visited Jammu & Kashmir as part of South Asia Free Media Association (SAFMA) initiative, Shabir Shah was one separatist leaders who hosted them. Many Pakistani journalists then marvelled at the opulent manner in which Shah lived and offered them costly gifts.
Meanwhile, Asiya Andrabi, another separatist, secessionist leader heading Dukhtaran e Millat (DeM), faces the prospects of a life sentence. The NIA had, a couple of days ago, requested the special court where she is being tried, along with two of her associates, that she should be incarcerated for life in view of seriousness of her anti-national activities.
It is likely that the court will announce its verdict in the next few weeks or months. After the abrogation of Article 370 in August 2019, one by one most separatist leaders have been put behind bars. In most cases, the courts have also gone along, preferring not to enlarge them at bail. This means there is hardly any separatist leader who is not facing the music for his or her past misdeeds.
