(This is a multi-part series that will appear in the next few days. This is Part-III of the series. Part-I and Part-II can be read here.)
NEW DELHI: In an affidavit filed before the Delhi High Court, jailed Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF) chairman Mohammad Yasin Malik has dismissed allegations that he orchestrated the killing, genocide, or gang rape of Kashmiri Pandits.
Instead, he recounted, a long record of public engagement, including marathon dialogues with senior Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) leaders and multiple visits by Hindu religious heads, including two Shankaracharyas, to his residence in Srinagar.
The affidavit, submitted in response to the National Investigation Agency’s (NIA) arguments during appeal proceedings, is the first comprehensive reply from Yasin Malik on accusations that have hung over him for years. His account, spanning the political, militant, and later non-violent phases of his career, seeks to counter what he calls a “completely wrong narrative” constructed against him.
Malik’s filing opens with a firm denial. He also challenged any enquiry to probe his role in the killings of Kashmiri Pandits.
“There are unsubstantiated claims that the Kashmiri Pandits’ exodus happened because of the alleged genocide and gang rape initiated by me. I welcome the Intelligence Bureau to place on record all plausible information relevant to that period, which could prove beyond a reasonable doubt if I had any involvement whatsoever. If at all these grotesque allegations were to be true, I shall hang myself without any trial and pronounce my name to go down the annals of history as a blot and curse to mankind.”
He argues that the NIA, by highlighting decades-old cases already pending in Jammu’s TADA court, is attempting to smear him rather than pursue justice.
‘Three types of Yasin Malik’
Tracing his own evolution, Malik outlines what he calls three phases of his life:
1. 1984-1988: “A young lad who firmly believed in political institutions and pursued the path voraciously to have the Kashmiri issue resolved.”
2. 1988-1994: “A militant who picked up the armed struggle after witnessing humiliation by law enforcement agencies and anarchy in the democratic institutions.”
3. 1994 to date: “A political person pursuing the agenda through the peace process, religiously practicing the non-violent democratic and peaceful way as taught by Mahatma Gandhi.”
For Malik, the tragedy of Kashmir lies in the state’s unwillingness to allow space for non-violent dissent. “It is a true irony,” he writes, “that in the nation of Mahatma Gandhi, who spread the idea of non-violence to the world, there was no space for a non-violent movement for a cause.”
Encounters with RSS leadership
Perhaps the most surprising section of Malik’s affidavit is his description of sustained dialogue with the leadership of the RSS, the ideological parent of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party.
He recalls that in 2001, the Centre for Dialogue and Reconciliation facilitated a marathon meeting between him and RSS leaders at New Delhi’s India International Centre. The session, he says, lasted “for a good five hours.”
“Instead of keeping an arm’s length distance from me - or rather not touching someone like me with a ten-foot pole - the RSS leadership chose to engage directly,” Malik writes.
He also cites repeated invitations to the residence of Admiral K. N. Suri, chairperson of the Vivekananda International Foundation, a think tank often linked with the RSS.
“Admiral Suri frequently invited me to his residence in New Delhi for luncheons and also to the India International Centre,” Malik notes.
Another Kashmiri Pandit leader, ‘Surender Amardhar’ (Surinder Ambardar), whom he describes as “RSS-linked,” visited Malik’s Srinagar home with the same purpose of dialogue and outreach.”
Visits from two Shankaracharyas
Malik discloses that two Shankaracharyas, heads of influential Hindu monastic seats, visited his home in Srinagar “not once but umpteen number of times” and even held press conferences with him.
“Isn’t it intriguing and a point to ponder over,” he asks, “that instead of keeping someone like me at bay, such representatives of the majority community decided to associate their godly name with someone facing such grave and heinous allegations?”
The visits, he suggests, symbolise a willingness in sections of India’s religious leadership to engage with Kashmiri separatists rather than shun them.
Malik describes his “Signature Campaign” journey through Jammu’s districts of Doda, Bhaderwah, Kishtwar and Udhampur. In Udhampur, he visited a migrant camp housing displaced Kashmiri Pandit families. (He mentions the two-year-long signature campaign started in 2002. The signature campaign, called Safr-e-Azadi, that took him and his JKLF cadres across all districts of Jammu and Kashmir started in 2007. Some of his meetings with Kashmiri Pandits, which he mentions in his affidavit, were reported by newspapers back then.)
He recalls beginning his interaction with a Kashmiri woman by reciting a couplet from a Kashmiri saint-poetess, which moved many to tears.
“It was an emotional and tearful visit,” he says. “I met migrant families, listened to their grievances, and shared in their pain.”
Malik insists that his politics was never communal. “I will be dishonest if I forget the role of Kashmiri Pandit police officers like Kuldeep Khoda, former Director General of Police, and Ramesh Jala (Ramesh Jalla), who contributed a lot to bring harmony among Muslims and Pandits.” He also mentions the role of social activist Madhu Kishwar in keeping in touch with him.
Remembering massacres
On the issue of Pandit killings, Malik refers to official figures. Former DGP Kuldeep Khoda, he notes, publicly stated in 2010 that 167 Kashmiri Pandits had been killed between 1990 and 2010.
Most of these, Malik says, were in four massacres: Sangrampora (Budgam), Wandhama (Ganderbal), Shopian, and Doda — all after 1996.
He stresses that he publicly condemned those killings. “I mourned, criticised, held strikes, and actively participated in the cremation process of the unfortunate deceased,” Malik says.
He recalls rushing to Doda after a massacre: “I reached at 10 P.M.; senior BJP leader Professor Nirmal Singh was present. He remarked that ‘I told my folks that Mr Yasin Malik will most certainly come here’. The next day, I sat on a protest dharna in Doda town, purely with complete love and compassion towards the Kashmiri Pandits.”
The affidavit also recounts Malik’s early experiences, which he says pushed him towards militancy. Arrested during the controversial 1987 elections, he was detained in the notorious Red 16 interrogation centre.
“Thanks to torture, unhygienic meals and contaminated water, my blood got infected. One of my heart valves was affected,” he writes. “Hundreds of members of our organisation, including myself, were detained under the Public Safety Act. I landed up spending the entire year of 1987 in jail.”
On release, Malik says he and his colleagues concluded there was “no scope for non-violent democratic movement in India.” That conviction led to the JKLF’s embrace of armed struggle in 1988.
Malik insists that the allegations of orchestrating atrocities on Pandits were “baseless, frivolous and disgusting,” implanted through media, films, and the NIA’s chargesheet.
“A completely wrong narrative has been framed against me,” he declares. “If I were truly guilty of genocide or gang rape, no sane government would have allowed me to speak on as critical an issue in independent India as Kashmir.”
From 1994 onwards, Malik maintains, he renounced arms and embraced Gandhian non-violence.
“For me, the challenge has been to find creative ways of carrying out non-violent struggle in the face of violent state oppression, a violence-fixated news media, the lack of a serious dispute resolution process, and the continuing lack of empathy in India towards Kashmiri sacrifices,” he writes.
Breach of Faith
He accuses the present government of breaching faith by reviving 35-year-old cases, despite the spirit of a ceasefire. “In complete breach of faith, suddenly the present dispensation has started trial of two CBI-TADA related militant cases. This is completely against the spirit and genesis of the ceasefire agreement,” Malik says.
Malik frames his story not only as a defence of himself but also as a broader commentary on the Kashmir conflict.
“The state is like a parent for the child. It must have compassion and benevolence in response to anger and frustration,” he argues. “Lack of awareness and consciousness of the state pushed many simple young students like Yasin towards armed struggle. It is only lose-lose for both sides.”
He calls it “unfortunate” that in the land of Buddha and Gandhi, the state chose “the most irrational manner” to deal with dissent.
The affidavit’s significance lies less in its legal standing, since cases against Malik are being heard separately in Jammu courts, and more in the political narrative it seeks to shape.
By invoking ties with the RSS and visits from Shankaracharyas, Malik challenges the image of an irreconcilable militant, instead projecting himself as someone once considered worth engaging by India’s ideological and religious mainstream.
For the Kashmiri Pandit community, which continues to grieve its displacement and killings, Malik’s words may not erase memories or suspicions. But for Kashmir’s contested political history, the affidavit adds a new layer, raising questions about state narratives, the politics of engagement, and the stories left untold.
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