Pakistan court sentences 26/11 mastermind Hafiz Saeed to 31 years in prison

Hafiz Saeed, the mastermind of the 26/11 attack in Mumbai, was sentenced to 31 years in prison by an anti-terror court in Pakistan. The 71-year-old Lashkar-e-Taiba chief has also been fined Rs 340,000.

Saeed was sentenced in two cases. In the first, he was sentenced to 16 and a half years in jail. The Jamaat ud Dawa head will serve 15 and a half years in prison in the second one. 

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As per reports, a mosque and madrassa that Hafiz Saeed allegedly built will be confiscated. 

Hafiz Saeed is a UN- designated terrorist. The United States put a $10 million bounty on his head. In 2020, the 71-year-old was sentenced to over 15 years in jail by an anti-terror court in one of the several terror financing cases against him. 

The terrorist mastermind has been in and out of detention for the past several years, during which he delivered speeched targetting India in his speeches. 

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Hafiz Saeed was arrested by the Counter Terrorism Department (CTD) of Punjab in 2019 when he was travelling to Gujranwala from Lahore to appear before an anti-terrorism court. 

As per the US House Foreign Affairs Committee, Saeed has been arrested and released eight times since 2001. Four of his aides were detained in Pakistan in 2017. However, they were released about 11 months later. 

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In November last year, six leaders of the banned Jamaat-ud-Dawah (JuD) were acquitted by a Pakistan courtin a terror-financing case. 

This was months after they – Malik Zafar Iqbal, Yahya Mujahid (JuD spokesperson), Nasarullah, Samiullah, and Umar Bahadur – were handed a nine-year imprisonment term by a Lahore court.