NIA Names Hafiz Saeed in Pahalgam Attack Case

Synopsis

The National Investigation Agency (NIA) has issued a supplementary chargesheet against Lashkar-e-Taiba chief Hafiz Saeed in the case of terror attack in Pahalgam that resulted in the deaths of 26 civilians on April 2025. The charges sheet filed before the NIA Special Court in Jammu includes a case under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act against Saeed, who has been named as chief of LeT and its proxy outfit, The Resistance Front.

The case of the new name in an ongoing investigation

Lashkar-e-Taiba chief Hafiz Saeed was named as an accused in a supplementary chargesheet presented on Monday before the National Investigation Agency (NIA) Special Court in Jammu in the case of the April 22 terror attack in Pahalgam, which left 25 tourists and one local civilian dead.

In its statement, NIA has continued its investigation into the case to find out the entire conspiracy by Pakistan to sponsor terrorism across the border in Indian territory.

Saeed has been charged in the individual capacity and as the chief of the banned LeT and its proxy outfit The Resistance Front under provisions of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023, and the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967 with waging war against India.

The Chargesheet has been created to build on the Earlier Chargesheet

The supplementary filing follows the NIA's initial 1,597-page chargesheet filed on December 15, 2025, which identified Pakistani handler Sajid Jatt and included names of three terrorists killed in the Operation Mahadev launched in July 2025 and two arrested accused. The previous filing also named LeT/TRF as a legal entity that planned, facilitated and carried out the attack.

The agency’s latest document, it said, "gives information about the conspiracy of Pakistan, Saeed's involvement and the evidence gathered by the NIA after painstaking scientific investigations and ground-based examination in the case.

The Network Behind the Attack

The details in the charge sheet that emerged as a result of the investigation reveal the extent to which Sajid Jatt had cultivated a network of contacts with overground workers in south Kashmir and how this network was put to use in organizing the Pahalgam massacre.

The NIA also claims Jatt had played a pivotal role in setting up TRF as the local wing of Lashkar-e-Taiba, an effort to make Pakistan-backed terrorism a local insurgency. He is separately charged for helping in the supply of arms and narcotics to Jammu and Kashmir through drones across the border.

Chargesheet said the three attackers were speaking Urdu in a Punjabi accent and repeatedly talking about Jatt @ Ali in the safety of the area before the attack, while there were security camps and troop movements around the area before the attack; they were allegedly discussing the upcoming Shri Amarnath Yatra.

Background to the Case

The FIR registering the attack was initially filed at the police station in Anantnag, later the Union Home Ministry handed it over to the NIA. The killings got international condemnation, including a Quad statement which warned against ‘coercion' and ‘terrorism' in the Indo-Pacific and specifically criticized the Pahalgam attack.

Outlook

With Saeed now formally named alongside the LeT/TRF network as a legal entity, the case adds to a body of evidence India has compiled over the past year to establish cross-border culpability — evidence that is likely to feature prominently in India's continuing diplomatic pressure on Pakistan over cross-border terrorism.