India, April 23 -- The National Investigation Agency (NIA) on Wednesday told the Delhi High Court that taking the names of senior politicians and bureaucrats does not absolve separatist leader Yasin Malik or negate his links with militants like Hafiz Saeed.

The NIA filed a rejoinder to Malik's reply to its plea for enhancing his life sentence in a terror-funding case to death penalty and asserted that the Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF) chief was "well connected with multiple terrorist organisations and with supporters of the terrorist organisation LeT" and that he dropped names of senior politicians, media personnel, foreign delegates and bureaucrats to gain popularity and draw public sympathy.

The NIA stated that Mailk canno...