Delhi HC to hear NIA’s plea for death penalty for Yasin Malik on April 22

The Delhi High Court on Wednesday, January 28, 2026, gave four weeks to the National Investigation Agency (NIA) to respond to separatist leader Yasin Malik’s reply to his appeal seeking death penalty for him in the terror financing case and scheduled the matter for hearing on April 22, 2026.

While Malik, who was almost released from Tihar jail where he was serving life sentence in the case, accused the institution of “wasting time” and causing him “trauma” by “taking history” in his appeal filed in 2023, a bench comprising Justices Navin Chawla and Ravinder Dudeja said there was no urgency in the case.

The court panel said, “There is no emergency. This is to increase the sentence. You have already been sentenced to life imprisonment.”

The court gave four weeks to the NIA as the “last opportunity” to file its reply.

The NIA lawyer stated that Mailk submitted a lengthy response to the agency’s objection, even stating that the content was “irrelevant” to the case and that the response was under review.

He also disputed Malik’s claim that the NIA was constantly seeking postponements and said Malik himself took a year to respond to the appeal.

He also informed the court that the agency wanted a secret hearing on the matter.

A court in Delhi sentenced Malik, chief of the banned Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF), to life imprisonment on May 24, 2022, after finding him guilty of various offenses under the stringent Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) and the Indian Penal Code (IPC).

NIA filed an appeal in the high court in 2023, seeking enhancement of life imprisonment to maximum death penalty.

NIA, in its plea before the apex court seeking enhancement of death penalty, said that if death penalty is not given to such “dreadful terrorists” for their admission of crime, penal policy will be completely eroded and terrorists will find a way out to avoid death penalty.

The NIA argued that the life imprisonment was not commensurate with the crimes committed by the terrorists when the nation and the families of the soldiers suffered loss of life and the trial court’s conclusion that Malik’s crimes did not fall under the category of “rarest of rare cases” for the purpose of imposing the death penalty was “ex facie legally flawed and wholly unsustainable”.

In his response to the NIA’s call, Mailk said he had spent nearly three decades as a key figure in a state-sanctioned “back channel” mechanism, working with a series of chief ministers, intelligence chiefs and even businessmen to foster peace in Jammu and Kashmir.

In his 85-page affidavit filed before the Delhi High Court, Malik shared details of his journey, from school days to links with terrorists and meetings with political leaders.

He claimed the state was trying to “erase” his history of engagement.

“Being a scapegoat in politics is nothing new, it’s a kind of new normal, but being a sacrificial goat is something that goes far beyond the vanity of morality, if there ever was one in politics,” Malik said.