The family members of a Kashmiri couple detained in New Delhi for their alleged links with the Islamic State, Tuesday said that the duo have been framed and the charges labeled against them are “fictitious and imaginary.”
On March 8, Delhi police’s special cell claimed they had detained a Kashmiri living in a rented flat in Jamia Nagar for links with the Islamic State’s Khorasan Province. It said the couple were involved in inciting protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act and were in possession of objectionable material.
Sehrish Sami, sister of the Kashmiri man, Jahanzaib Sami Wani, who has been arrested by Delhi police along with his wife, Hina Bashir Beig, rubbished the charges against her brother.
“He moved to Delhi due to lockdown and internet blockade in Kashmir after the abrogation of Article 370 on August 5, 2019,” she told Maktoob.
“My brother is an IT professional and was working for a UK based company in Srinagar,” she said he joined the company in June last year.
She said her brother had shifted to Delhi temporarily in September last year at the behest of the company due to the continued internet shutdown in Kashmir.
Sehrish said the company had arranged accommodation for him at Okhla.
Sehrish also said that after getting married on October 6, her brother and his wife moved into a rented flat in Delhi on October 26.
“He was all set to return home as the internet has been restored in Kashmir,” Sehrish told Maktoob.
“Last time I spoke to him he said they will come home soon,” she said her father Abdul Sami, a businessman, and her sister-in law’s father have reached Delhi to arrange legal help for her brother and his wife.
She said they were informed about her brother and sister in law’s arrest by one of her Jahanzaib’s friends who was contacted by the landlord.
“He is innocent. I want my children back,” Sami Wani’s mother who is a retired teacher told Maktoob. She has also criticized the state’s framing of Kashmiri Muslims as terrorists.
