National

The Gag Is In Place

The bias against protesters from Kashmir

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The Gag Is In Place
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Muzzles At The Ready

  • March 2013 Yasin Malik pushed around by Shiv Sena activists
  • Feb 2013 Kashmiris and activists protesting against Afzal hanging attacked by VHP/Bajranj Dal
  • Feb 2013 Kashmiri leaders were under ‘house arrest’ in Delhi after the execution of Afzal Guru
  • Mar 2012 Aggressive protest by ABVP against Syed Ali Shah Geelani, a separatist leader
  • Feb 2011 Syed Ali Shah Geelani was not allowed to leave his place of stay in New Delhi or return to the Kashmir Valley
  • Oct 2010 Syed Ali Shah Geelani heckled by a group of Kashmiri Pandits during a lecture 
  • Aug 2010 Pandits oppose anti-govt protest by separatists

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In the rising summer heat of the first week of May, Delhi witnessed furious protests by Sikhs against the acquittal of Sajjan Kumar, a Congressman, in a 1984 anti-Sikh riots case. They got to make their protests felt, and with demonstrative force. But another group—also defined as Indians—were not allowed their right to peaceful protest. More than 150 people from the Kashmir Valley who had turned up in Delhi to stage a hunger strike at Jantar Mantar did not get permission to do so. Their demands were familiar: the rel­ease of political prisoners, explanations for the disappearance of young men and women; the return of the rem­ains of Maqbool Bhat and Afzal Guru to their families. But the Parli­ament Street police station did not permit the demonstration. The group ended up staying at a hall in Jamia Nagar, watched over by the Delhi police.

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Arshika Khan, nine years, is one of the members of the group. Poster in hand, tears in her eyes, she pleads for the release of her father, Showkat Ahmed Khan, who has been in jail for two years. “I want to go to school with my father. Please release him, he’s inn­ocent,” she cries. “It’s my 10th birthday on the 28th of this month, and I would like to celebrate it with my father. Is there no one in Delhi who will listen to me? Will you please pass on my request to the government?” Parveena Ahangar, an active member of the Association of Parents of Disappeared Persons, curses the government for not caring to listen to peaceful protesters from the Valley: these, after all, were the parents, wives, widows and children of people who had gone missing, or had been killed or arrested, often on flimsy grounds. Also with the group is Shahmala, mother of Maqbool Bhat, an iconic JKLF leader who was executed in the 1980s.

The protest group tried again: accompanied by former IAS officer B.D. Sharma (who has helped government negotiations with the Maoists) and poet-activist Vara Vara Rao, they made a booking at the Press Club of India. But at the last minute, the organisers were told their booking was cancelled. “Even the Press Club has been shut to us,” says Rao, who had been accosted by activists of Arvind Kejriwal’s Aam Aadmi Party outside the club. Club president Anand Sahay says, “It was the police who suggested we cancel the booking. The Parliament session was still on and the club is close to Par­liament. It was cancelled to avoid any mishap or bad situation.” But members of the group wonder how some old women, children and a bunch of activists would have caused any problem.

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Later, they were forced to leave Delhi. Police escorted their buses till Haryana. “Don’t we have any right to be heard?” one of the protesters asked. “They claim that Kashmir is part of India, a democratic country, but they don’t allow Kashmiris to speak, demonstrate or protest in a democratic manner.”

S.A.R. Geelani, who was acquitted in the Parliament attack case and now runs the Committee for Release of Political Prisoners, says, “This isn’t the first time people from Kashmir are being prohibited from dialogue or from registering their protest.” Yasin Malik, a separatist leader who had accompanied the group to Delhi, says he was manhandled by the police and sent back a day ahead of the planned demonstration. The police held Malik’s own security to be the issue. But  a reluctance to listen to ordinary Kash­miris seems to be the real thing.

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