Islamabad/New Delhi: Mushaal Mullick, the Pakistani wife of jailed Indian terrorist Yasin Malik, has said in a television interview that she pleaded with the Pakistani government to negotiate a prisoner swap – demanding her husband’s release in exchange for Border Security Force (BSF) jawan Purnam Kumar Shaw.
The BSF jawan was apprehended by Pakistani Rangers on April 23, a day after terrorists – including those from Pakistan – shot dead 26 persons, most of them tourists from across India, at Pahalgam in Jammu and Kashmir. Shaw was released by Pakistan on Wednesday morning.
Speaking to Pakistan’s DAWN News, Mushaal claimed she hasn’t spoken to Malik in over six years. She expressed fears that Malik, formerly of the Jammu Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF), who admitted to the murder of four Indian Air Force (IAF) personnel and others, would be hanged by India.
“There is no real evidence against him. Yet, they are demanding his death sentence. Pakistan must do something for him. I had earlier heard that a woman IAF pilot had been captured by our forces. Later, I came to know that it was not true. Then I heard of the BSF jawan and pushed for an exchange,” the actor said.
Indian officials believe that Pakistan may have demanded a prisoner ‘swap’ had it been in a better position after Operation Sindoor. Maybe, that is why they held on to the BSF jawan for 21 days for a minor infringement that is normally resolved within hours. However, after the kind of destruction it witnessed, Pakistan decided against any such move.
Mushaal lives in Pakistan with her daughter and has been used often by the establishment there as a propaganda tool against India. In 2023, she was even appointed as an advisor on human rights by caretaker PM Anwaar-ul-Haq Kakar – a reward for her consistent anti-India rhetoric.
Mushaal met Yasin Malik in 2005 and married him in 2009, in a ceremony that was televised live across Pakistan. At the time, she was 23 and he was 42. An artist since the age of six, Mushaal specializes in semi-nude female portraits, often painted in pastel, charcoal, and glass.
Malik is a convicted terrorist who played a direct role in the ethnic cleansing of Kashmiri Hindus, the murder of the IAF personnel and abduction of Rubaiya Sayeed, daughter of then Union home minister Mufti Mohammad Sayeed.