Hafiz Saeed free to roam in Pakistan, envoy Abdul Basit says

NEW DELHI: India on Monday slammed Islamabad for not doing enough to bring Hafiz Saeed to justice after Pakistan high commissioner Abdul Basit said the JuD chief was free to roam around in his country as there was no case against him.

In its reaction, MEA described Saeed as an "evil mastermind" of the Mumbai attacks, who remained free only because he was living in Pakistan.

"Our views on Hafiz Saeed are very clear. To us, he is the evil mastermind of the attacks on Mumbai and one of the accused in an Indian court for killings on streets of Mumbai. We have repeatedly asked Pakistan that he should be apprehended and taken through normal judicial process.

"Alas! He has never been arrested on account of 26/11. Therefore ... he is only free because he is a Pakistani citizen," external affairs ministry spokesman Syed Akbaruddin said here.

This was hours after Basit's remark about Saeed being a free citizen. "Hafiz Saeed is a Pakistani national so he is free to roam around. So what is the problem ... he is a free citizen so there is no issue as far as Pakistan is concerned. Courts have already exonerated him. There is no case pending against him," Basit said.

Asked about Pakistan's stand that there was not enough evidence to prove his involvement, the MEA spokesman said, "99 per cent evidence in this case is in Pakistan. That is because the entire conspiracy was hatched in Pakistan. The planning for this dastardly act was done in Pakistan."

"The financing for this act was undertaken in Pakistan and people involved who were involved in this were from Pakistan. Therefore, it has always been our view that it devolves on Pakistan that it ensures that criminals like Hafiz Saeed were brought to book and justice was delivered in the instance of crime in Mumbai," he added.