Jailed Kashmiri separatist leader Yasin Malik told a Srinagar court that he will not contest trial proceedings in the 1990 murder of Kashmiri Pandit nurse Sarla Bhat. Malik, who heads the banned Jammu Kashmir Liberation Front, asked the court to sentence him to death. India’s National Investigation Agency has separately petitioned for the death penalty against him for the Bhat killing. Malik is already serving a life sentence given in 2022 in a separate terror-financing case.
In an emotional affidavit, Malik also announced his intention to divorce his wife, Mushaal Hussein Mullick, a Pakistani national he married in 2009. The couple has a daughter, Razia Sultana. Malik wrote that he did not want Mullick to shoulder the burden of his circumstances for the rest of her life, urging her to begin a new chapter with dignity and hope while expressing love and respect for his wife and daughter.
The court has not yet ruled on the trial’s disposition or any eventual sentence. Malik’s decision not to contest the Sarla Bhat trial removes any defense against the capital charge he faces.