SRINAGAR: After being held for almost two years on terror-related charges, Kashmiri journalist Fahad Shah returned home on Thursday.
The Jammu and Kashmir High Court granted bail to journalist Fahad Shah, the editor of the now-defunct news portal The Kashmir Walla last week. The court’s decision, rendered on November 17, came with scathing criticism for the Jammu and Kashmir government’s decision to resurrect a 2011 case against Shah even after he had been granted bail twice by different courts.
Kashmiri journalist Fahad Shah has returned home Thursday after nearly two years in detention on terror charges
CPJ welcomes his release on bail. All charges against Shah must be dropped and the ban on his publication The Kashmir Walla @tkwmag revoked https://t.co/eCjFpf1SRd pic.twitter.com/X7NtyiTNnY
— CPJ Asia (@CPJAsia) November 23, 2023
Shah, who was arrested in February 2022 under the country’s anti-terror laws, was accused by the government of glorifying militancy through an article titled ‘The shackles of slavery will break’, published on his portal in 2011.
The court’s 25-page bail order underscored the lack of substantial evidence connecting Shah’s writings to acts of militancy over the past 11 years. “From then till date, no evidence has been brought on record that the offending article was responsible in provoking persons to take to militancy. Not a single witness says this,” the order reads.