A district court in Jaipur on Tuesday ordered life imprisonment to 12 alleged members of the Students Islamic Movement of India (SIMI), accused of working for the Indian Mujahideen (IM). The case dates back to 2014 when the accused were arrested by the Rajasthan ATS.
According to IANS, all of them were engineering students and residents of Sikar, Jodhpur, Jaipur and Pali districts.
District & Sessions Judge Uma Shankar Vyas sentenced the 12 persons- Waqar Azhar, Mohammed Sakib Ansari, Barkat Ali, Mohammed Maroof, Ashraf Ali Khan, Mohammed Ammar Yasar, Abdul Majid, Mohammed Wahid Gouri, Mohammed Umar, Mohammed Akib, Mohammed Waqar and Mohammed Sajjad to life imprisonment.
The court said that the 12 convicted had committed offences that came under the category of waging war against the Indian Republic. They have also been booked under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA).
Another accused, Mashraf Iqbal was acquitted of all charges.
The SIMI is a banned organisation that was formed in Aligarh, Uttar Pradesh, in April 1977. SIMI maintains that concepts of secularism, democracy and nationalism, keystones of the Indian Constitution, are antithetical to Islam. They aim to restore the supremacy of Islam through the resurrection of the Caliphate.
The Indian government banned the organisation in 2001. The ban was lifted in August 2008 by a special tribunal but was reinstated on 6 August 2008. In February 2019, the ban on SIMI was extended for a period of five more years starting February 1, 2019, under the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA).
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Rushda Fathima Khan is the Staff Reporter for The Cognate.
