Murder Trial Against Bitta Karate: Srinagar Court Lists May 4 As Next Date Of Hearing

Advocate Utsav Bains, who has filed the application on behalf of Tickoo’s family recently told the media, they hope that they will get justice from the court.

Asked whether the video of Karate confessing to killing Tickoo was submitted in court, the lawyer stated that it would be done in the course of arguments.

He said that “We will do it in the due course of the arguments because in that video Karate says that he killed Tickoo because he was a member of the RSS. It is a submission of a cognizable offense.”

He said the other side argued that a PIL by the NGO Roots in Kashmir seeking orders for an investigation into cases of killings of Kashmiri Pandits in the valley was dismissed by the Supreme Court.
However, he argued that under criminal law, the family had a right to take the other side for a criminal trial.

He said that “The family of Tickoo didn’t go to the SC. We have not even filed an affidavit in the SC in the Roots in Kashmir petition. So, my right to criminal trial does not get affected by that PIL and the dismissal order.”

Bains Stated that “My right in criminal law, in a cognizable offense, still remains. We all know that the situation has improved in Kashmir, and the family after 31 years, wants justice and closure in this case. So, we are making all efforts under the criminal law, under the CrPC, to get Bitta Karate on the trail.”

In an interview in 1991, Karate, now a leader in the outlawed Jammu Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF), admitted that he killed several Pandits, including Tickoo, during the peak of insurgency in the Valley in the 1990s.

However, Karate subsequently said that he didn’t kill anyone and claimed that he “admitted to killings” only under duress.

In June 1990, Karate was arrested under the Jammu and Kashmir Public Safety Act and was in jail till 2006, after which he was released on indefinite bail. He was arrested again in 2019 by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) on charges of terror funding.