J&K agency charges Yasin Malik in 1990 nurse murder

The Jammu and Kashmir State Investigation Agency filed a comprehensive chargesheet on Monday, naming five individuals in the 1990 kidnapping and killing of Kashmiri Pandit nurse Sarla Bhat, a case that had remained unresolved for over three decades. The 737-page document designates Yasin Malik, the chief of the banned Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front, as a key accused.

Bhat, a 27-year-old nurse at Srinagar's Sher-i-Kashmir Institute of Medical Sciences, was abducted from near her hostel on April 18, 1990. Her body, bearing multiple bullet wounds, was discovered the following day in the city's Malbagh area. A note left with her remains falsely labelled her a police informant, which investigators now describe as a pretext for a targeted killing.

Alongside Malik, the chargesheet names Khurshid Ahmad Chalkoo, Abdul Hamid Sheikh, Mohammad Yousuf Sofi, and Ghulam Mohammad Taploo as co-accused. Sheikh, Sofi, and Taploo are deceased. Malik is currently serving a life sentence in Delhi's Tihar Jail in a separate terror funding case. Chalkoo is believed to have fled to Pakistan, and legal proceedings have been initiated against him.

The case, originally registered in 1990, was...