A 65-year-old detenu, a member of the banned Jamaat-I-Islamia, charged under the stringent Public Safety Act and sent outside Jammu and Kashmir has died in a jail at Allahabad, officials said on Sunday.
Ghulam Mohammed Bhat, a resident of Kulangam in frontier district of Handwara in North Kashmir, was among hundreds of people detained under the PSA immediately after the Centre scrapped the special status of Jammu and Kashmir on August 5 and divided it into two union territories -- Ladakh and Jammu and Kashmir.
The PSA slapped on Ghulam Mohammed Bhat, an active member of the banned Jamaat-I-Islamia, was to end on January 9 next year, they said.
Ghulam Mohammed Bhat was suffering from various ailments and died at Allahabad's Naini central jail on Saturday at 4 PM, the officials said, adding his body was airlifted and brought to Srinagar and handed over to the family for burial.
Two cases -- one in 2016 and another this year -- were registered against him under various sections of the law including those under the anti-terror law Unlawful (Activities) Prevention Act.
Reacting to the news, the official Twitter handle of former chief minister Mehbooba Mufti, which is being operated by her daughter Iltija, condemned the incident and said Ghulam Mohammed Bhat is the first Kashmiri political detainee to have died at a jail outside Kashmir. "MHA (Ministry of Home Affairs) has blood on its hands and must be held accountable."
Around 300 political detenues, held under the PSA, were shifted out of the Kashmir Valley post August 5 and lodged in various jails of Uttar Pradesh, Haryana and Rajasthan.
The PSA has also been slapped on former state chief minister Farooq Abdullah, who is a sitting member of Lok Sabha. He has been kept at his residence.
Mehbooba Mufti and Omar Abdullah, another former chief minister, have been kept under preventive detention since August 5.
PM Modi Chairs Security Meet Amid Rising Terror Attacks In Jammu Major Crackdown Launched On Terror Network In J&K After Doda Encounter Hope Statehood Is Restored To Jammu And Kashmir Before Assembly Polls: Omar Abdullah "Jindal Group Executive Showed Porn, Groped Me On Flight": Woman To NDTV Bangladesh Imposes Curfew, Deploys Military As 105 Die In Protests Over 300 Indian Students Return Home As 105 Bangladeshis Killed In Protests Wife Among Two Jailed For Life For Man's Murder In Gurugram: Cops 1,100 Flights Cancelled In US As Microsoft Outage Disrupts Operations Elon Musk Congratulates PM Modi On Becoming Most Followed Leader On X Track Latest News Live on NDTV.com and get news updates from India and around the world.