Separatist leaders Monday lashed out at “communal forces” and warned them to “refrain from activities aimed at spreading communal hatred in the State.” The leaders—majority of them placed under house arrest—also castigated the government for not allowing people of Kashmir to protest against the murderous attack on three Kashmiri truckers in Udhampur district of Jammu on Saturday.
Chairman of Hurriyat Conference (G) Syed Ali Geelani, while thanking people for observing a complete shutdown against the Udhampur attack, said the strike was a “clear message to communal forces that their hooliganism won’t be tolerated.”
“Entire Kashmir is up against the evil designs of communal forces. Kashmiris are struggling for their basic and birth rights and to divert our attention from our freedom struggle, the fascist forces of India are creating new issues every day,” Geelani said in a statement. “Sometimes they try to engage us in cow slaughtering issue and sometimes they allow Ahmadiyes to provoke the sentiments of Muslim community and now the Udhampur incident is aimed at disturbing our economic condition by blocking the only trade link of Kashmir.”
The Hurriyat (G) chairman, who continues to be under house detention, cautioned that “if Udhampur-like incidents do not stop forthwith, we will launch an agitation for opening of alternate and natural trade routes of Kashmir.”
JKLF LEADERS DETAINED
Several JKLF leaders were detained during a protest march at Lal Chowk on Monday. They were protesting against attack on Kashmiri truck drivers “by right-wing activists” in Jammu.
According to a JKLF spokesman, when the protestors tried to march towards M A Road, police swung into action and detained several Front leaders that include JKLF vice-chairman Showkat Ahmad Bakshi, Noor Muhammad Kalwal, and many others.
The Front leaders shouted slogans against ‘communal forces’ and also expressed solidarity with Muslims of Jammu region.
Meanwhile, the JKLF Chairman Muhammad Yasin Malik, who is under house arrest, termed the detention of Front leaders as “unjustified.”
“Police unleashed worst kind of state terrorism on peaceful protestors who were protesting against growing attacks on innocent Kashmiris. Police is trying to prove itself more loyal than the king. Instead of stopping attacks on Kashmiris in Udhampur, it is unleashing terror on innocent Kashmiris who are protesting against these murderous attacks,” Malik said in a statement here. “Such terrorist acts have harassed those travelling on the highway but rulers, instead of acting against the attackers, are unleashing terror in Kashmir. These attacks seem to be part of plan to harm communal harmony in J&K.”
Malik said Kashmiris will “keep resisting state terrorism, oppression and suppression with passion and zeal.”
Democratic Freedom Party chairman Shabir Ahmad Shah Monday expressed solidarity with the family members of victims of Udhampur attack. A delegation of DFP also visited the families of victims. Shah, who is also under house arrest, expressed his strong resentment over the “growing communal activities” in Jammu province particularly in Udhampur.
National Front chairman Nayeem Ahmed Khan, who also continues to be under house detention, thanked people for observing a complete strike against the “hooliganism of anti-peace forces in Udhampur district.”
“Such acts are intolerable. The extremist forces are carrying out attacks on Kashmiri Muslims. We will not allow repeat of 1947. The strike was a solidarity and resolve to fight these communal forces,” Khan said.
Condemning the attacks on Kashmiri truck drivers in Udhampur, Jama’at-e-Islami said “RSS-BJP-sponsored communal goons seem to be given freedom to attack Muslim individuals at their will without any apprehension of a legal action.”
J&K High Court Bar Association took out a peaceful procession and held a sit-in outside the Sadder Court complex Srinagar to register its protest against the Udhampur incident.
While holding peaceful procession and raising slogans against the Sangh Pariwar, the members unanimously stated that “BJP-RSS cadres in the State are trying to create communal tension so that they get another occasion to go for ethnic cleansing of Muslims of Jammu division and establish a ‘Ram-Raj’ in J&K.”
Meanwhile, the Executive Members of the Bar Association also thanked the public in general and its members in particular, for making the Kashmir bandh call given by various factions, a success.
Dukhtaran-e-Milat General Secretary Nahida Nasreen said the strikes were no ultimate solution to the problem and therefore an “effective and impressive resistance movement should be started.”
Expressing concern over “Hindu fanatics attacking the Kashmiri truckers in Jammu”, Nasreen said if the “goons don’t stop, Kashmiris will be forced go for an economic boycott with them.”
