NEW DELHI: India’s National Investigation Agency (NIA) on Monday filed charges against Pakistan’s Hafiz Saeed, accusing him of orchestrating last year’s attack on tourists in India-held Kashmir.
The Pahalgam attack triggered a sharp escalation in tensions between the two nuclear-armed neighbours. Following the incident, New Delhi blamed Islamabad for the attack without presenting public evidence, suspended the Indus Waters Treaty unilaterally and launched strikes on Pakistani territory, to which Pakistan’s armed forces responded.
In a statement, the NIA said Saeed had been charged with “waging war against India and hatching a conspiracy from across the border”.
India had initially held the little-known group The Resistance Front (TRF) responsible for the attack. It now alleges that the organisation functions as a proxy for the banned Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) and has linked Saeed to the incident.
Pakistan has repeatedly rejected allegations of involvement in the Pahalgam attack and has called on India to provide evidence supporting its claims. Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif had also offered to facilitate an independent investigation into the incident, but New Delhi did not accept the proposal.
Saeed, the chief of Jamaat-ud-Dawa (JuD), had previously been convicted in Pakistan on terror financing charges. India has also long accused him of masterminding the 2008 Mumbai attacks.
