Three life terms for Kashmir’s Aasiya Andrabi fit India’s ‘broader pattern’

Legal experts say the 64-year-old grandmother’s harsh conviction is mainly based on offensive speech-making.

Activists and legal experts have condemned an Indian court’s verdict that handed down three life sentences to prominent Kashmiri separatist Aasiya Andrabi, saying the harsh sentencing of a 64-year-old woman “fits a broader pattern” of India’s policy with dissenting voices in the disputed region.

Andrabi, the founder of Dukhtaran-e-Millat (DeM), a banned all-women’s organisation, was sentenced on March 24 by a special National Investigative Agency (NIA) court in New Delhi. Two of her associates, Sofi Fehmeeda, a wheelchair-bound 36-year-old, and 61-year-old Nahida Nasreen, were also given 30 years in jail.

The three women were arrested by the NIA in 2018 under the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA), a draconian anti-terror law, and various sections of the Indian Penal Code.

The UAPA, first introduced in 2008 by the centrist Congress party, was given more teeth by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s right-wing government, which allowed authorities to declare individuals – not just organisations – as “terrorists” among the several amendments made in 2019.