Jammu & Kashmir administration extends detention of Mehbooba Mufti by 3 months under PSA

The Jammu and Kashmir government Friday extended the detention of former chief minister and PDP President Mehbooba Mufti under the stringent Public Safety Act (PSA) by another three months.

An order in this regard issued by J&K Principal Secretary Home Department, Shaleen Kabra said that the extension was “necessary” as recommended by law enforcing agencies. She will remain detained at her official residence at Fairview Bungalow, here, which has been declared a subsidiary jail.

Mehbooba, whose party PDP was an ally of the BJP till June 2018, remains one of the last mainstream political leaders booked and detained under PSA. She was first placed under preventive detention on 5 August 2019 and in February this year, she was charged under the PSA. Her detention under PSA was scheduled to lapse on August 5, 2020.

The PSA dossier prepared by the police against 60-year-old Mebooba in February mentions her tweets in the run up to abrogation of Article 370 citing “lynchings’” and “highway blockade” among others. It also accuses her of promoting separatism corroborated by ‘several confidential reports’ filed by agencies.

She has also been accused of making anti-national statements and extending support to organisations like Jamaat-e-Islamia J&K, which has been banned under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA).

The PSA is a preventive detention law, under which a person is taken into custody to prevent him or her from acting in any manner that is prejudicial to “the security of the state or the maintenance of the public order”.

It is very similar to the National Security Act that is used by other state governments for preventive detention.