The government of Punjab province of Pakistan has included the Mumbai 26/11 attack mastermind and Jamat-Ud-Dawa chief, Hafeez Saeed in the fourth schedule of the Anti-terrorism Act (ATA). As reported by a Pakistan daily, apart from Saeed, the Punjab government has also included one of his aide, Qazi Kashif’s name in the act.
Another three henchmen of Saeed are included in the list – Abdullah Obaid from Faisalabad, and Zafar Iqbal and Abdur Rehman Abid from the Markaz-i-Taiba, Muridke. As stated by the daily, all these 5 people including JuD chief Hafeez Saeed getting enlisted in ATA list were also house arrested on January 30 in Lahore amid an angry uproar from his party and political allies. They all were identified as the active members of the terrorist outfit JuD and Falah-i- Insaniyat (FIF).
The Counter Terrorism Department has been directed by the ministry to move and take necessary action against them. The Anti-Terrorism Act 1997 enables the government to mark a person as ‘proscribed’ and to place that person on the fourth schedule on an ex-parte basis.
A person is only enlisted in the fourth schedule of the ATA if he is linked with militancy in any way. One after getting enlisted faces a barrage of legal consequences like travel bans and scrutiny of assets etc. If any of the norms of the fourth schedule is violated then the accused has to face an imprisonment of up to three years and fine or both.
After being involvement in at least eight terror attacks which killed more than 100 people, Hafeez Saeed was enlisted under this act. Earlier, after the Mumbai terror attacks in November 2008, Saeed was also put under house arrest but the court freed him in 2009.
