Geelani really dying for Kashmir’s ecology?

Influential separatist leader should also call a shutdown on brick kilns

Ahmed Ali Fayyaz

SRINAGAR, Jun 20: Senior Kashmiri separatist leader, Syed Ali Shah Geelani, has, of late, begun to lay remarkable emphasis over the need to protect the Valley’s environment and ecology. In the last one week, Geelani has shown significant concern over the damage, according to him, caused to the Valley’s fragile ecology by the annual Amarnath pilgrimage. He has made specific non-political demand of reducing the pilgrimage period from existing two months to just 15 days and argued that similar arrangement was in place at Gangotri and other holy places in Uttaranchal.

Notwithstanding resting his entire argument on the 60-year-old UN resolutions, Geelani’s ideology of a theocratic Islamic system has little scope for geo-political boundaries. He seems to be confident that Jammu & Kashmir’s merger with Pakistan, in realization of what he calls ‘aspiration of the Kashmiris’, would be a service to the Islamic Republic of Pakistan. When he was led to believe during Amarnath land row in August 2008---by slogans like ‘kaun karega tarjumani, Syed Ali Shah Geelani’--- that he alone was the representative of the Kashmiris, he lost no time to assert.

At the TRC congregation, Geelani found two of the most prominent pro-Azadi leaders, namely Mirwaiz Umar Farooq and Mohammad Yasin Malik, already seated on the dais. Cutting them both dead, he sought the gathering’s vote of being the “only representative of the Kashmiris” and led the audience yell as many as 10 times in one go: “Ham Pakistani hain, Pakistan hamara hai”.

In contrast, Geelani has been complaining of “cultural aggression” and “ecological degradation” for quite some time now--- holding the “Indian occupational forces” responsible for both. So the fundamental question, unanswered in the minds of a many Kashmiris, is: Is the octogenarian separatist leader concerned about all hues of “cultural aggression” and “ecological degradation” in Kashmir or merely the one he finds the “Indian occupational forces” involved in?

At three of his thinly attended public meetings since the weekend last, Geelani has warned the Government of “a sustained struggle” in case his demand of restricting the pilgrimage period to 15 days was not acceded to. “It (Yatra period of 60 days) has been destroying our atmosphere”, he has complained. Those visiting Sonmarg and Pahalgam during the two-odd months of the pilgrimage would readily agree with Mr Geelani as the damage caused to the environ is colossal. Much like Geelani, they were also concerned over the raising of concrete structures at Baltal in 2008. But, this time around, they are perhaps equally concerned that their joining the chorus with Geelani could push the environment to the backburner exactly like in 2008 and bring region and religion to the forefront. This, they know, is bound to be catastrophic in perception of an equally negative reaction in Jammu.

Leela Karan Sharma of the 2008 Sangharsh fame and others of his ilk, who remained in oblivion in the last 20 months, have immediately got resuscitation in Geelani’s warning and have begun to find their role and place in the situation being communally charged in Jammu & Kashmir. Much like Congress-PDP coalition in 2008, Congress-NC ruling alliance seems to be having other priorities at hand.

Among the ordinary Kashmiris, many are surprised why Mr Geelani does not deliver a sermon on Director SKIMS, Dr Abdul Hamid Zargar, on the latter’s obligation of installing an incinerator for appropriate disposal of medical waste at the hospital. If the Valley’s jails and detention centers are Geelani’s “second home”, SKIMS has indisputably emerged as his “third home”. Every time Geelani was ‘arrested’ in the last several years, his detention has ended at SKIMS. Concerned over the environment, Geelani must be aware that J&K State Pollution Control Board has now slapped a final notice of closure on the SKIMS Director for ignoring to set up an incinerator at the state’s only tertiary care hospital.

Having never planted a tree on the World Arbor Day on March 21 or otherwise, Geelani is also supposed to be knowing well that sections of the Valley’s pro-Azadi and pro-Pakistan militants have caused more damage to the state’s sylvan cover---particularly in 1990-1996 period---than Army and paramilitary forces. Hundreds of compartments were denuded in broad daylight everywhere in Kashmir, including Geelani’s own Sopore-Rafiabad forests. One conservator and scores of Forest Department officials were not gunned down by military.

And the last, but not the least, Geelani has never raised his voice over the mushroom growth of cement plants---maximum of them laid by a Sopore-based business family---in the critical Khonmoh-Khrew belt, bordering Dachigam National Park on one side and the saffron fields of Pampore on another. While traveling more than any other political leader through Valley, Geelani has also witnessed how more than 300 completely unauthorized and illegal brick kilns have caused grave threat not only to environment but also to the poor human life. Should he not invoke his “only tool” of shutdown for a day, specifically for closing down these dangerously operating kilns or else prevail upon the owners to do a real good to the Kashmiris?

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