Srinagar, Feb. 3: A terrorist wanted over an Indian Airines hijack that is believed to have escalated tensions leading to the 1971 war with Pakistan has died in obscurity in Rawalpindi.

Ashraf Qureshi, who passed away yesterday at the age of 61, was 19 when he had hijacked the plane with cousin Hashim Qureshi while it was flying to Jammu from Srinagar on January 30, 1971, and took it to Lahore.

The two were members of National Liberation Front (NLF), a group fighting for “liberation” of both parts of Kashmir.

The hijackers, demanding the release of jailed colleagues, had let off the 26 passengers and four crew members but the plane was mysteriously set ablaze two days later. One version was that the duo did it on their own, the other that it was done at the behest of Pakistan.

New Delhi retaliated to the burning by banning flights over India to the erstwhile East Pakistan (Bangladesh), a move that some believe precipitated the war in December 1971. As a result of the air restrictions, Pakistan struggled to move troops and material in its battle against Bangladesh’s nationalists.

Pakistan arrested the Srinagar-born Ashraf and Hashim along with other members of the NLF.

However, Ashraf and the others were released three years later after Lahore High Court called them “patriots fighting for liberation of their motherland”. “But I was detained for nine years until 1980,” Hashim said.

While Ashraf preferred to stay in Pakistan, Hashim went to Europe in 1980 and returned to India in 2000. He was arrested at Delhi airport and brought to Srinagar later, spent a year in jail after which he was released on bail. Hashim is still being tried in the hijacking case.

In Pakistan, Ashraf concentrated on studies, completing his postgraduation in geology and a doctorate in Kashmiri. “He (Ashraf) was not given a job despite his qualification until 1985 when the Nawaz Sharif government made him the head of the Kashmiri department at Lahore University,” Hashim said.

J&K Liberation Front leader Mohammad Yasin Bhat recalled having met Ashraf in the early 1990s in PoK. “He had Parkinson’s then.”

Asharaf was buried at Mirpur in PoK in line with his last wish to be buried “in his mother country”. Hashim said Mirpur was chosen for another reason. “In 1974, he and other NLF activists had gathered in Mirpur and vowed to liberate Kashmir.”