JKLF calls Geelani’s autobiography ‘distortion of facts’

‘Four MLAs’ entry into Assembly in 1987 was Geelani’s not MUF’s decision. Their resignation in 1989 was under pressure from militants and people, not the call from conscience’

Ahmed Ali Fayyaz

Srinagar, Oct 16: Separatist hardliner Syed Ali Shah Geelani’s lately released autobiography ‘Wullar Kinaray” may trigger a fresh confrontation between Kashmir’s pro-Azadi and pro-Pakistan secessionists. Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF), militia-turned-political organisation of the pioneer of 23-year-long guerrilla movement, Mohammad Yasin Malik, has immediately dismissed the book as “gross distortion of facts” and decided to confront the author with a ‘factual treatise’ to put the history in the ‘right perspective’.

With the 48-year-old Mr Malik recuperating from a surgery in New Delhi, JKLF today went public with its bitter reaction to the pro-Pakistan Hurriyat chief’s autobiography. In a statement, it claimed that the octogenarian politician-author had “distorted a many facts to malign his rivals and former colleagues even as some of them were not alive and thus in no position to defend themselves. According to JKLF, Geelani had done so to pursue “petty benefits”. 

JKLF said that the author had written “many fabricated things” about JKLF and Muslim United Front (MUF) as also against the icons of the “freedom struggle” like Sofi Mohammad Akbar, Abdul Gani Lone. It alleged that Geelani had not spared even the “peoples’ revolution” which, it claimed, had been initiated by JKLF in 1989.

“This fabrication and distortion of history needs immediate rectification so that the historical facts are safeguarded and put in its right perspective before the nation. This is a firm belief of JKLF that everyone has a right to write, propagate and perform his or her own ideology”, said the statement. “But, at the same time, if history is put to question, everyone has a right to defence”, it added.

“To rectify the distorted facts in the said book JKLF will soon come up with a booklet in this regard. The booklet will try to clear the doubts created by Wullar Kay Kinaray and put history as it is before the nation”, JKLF asserted.

Malik’s outfit has taken exception to Geelani’s decree that JKLF was a “secular, non-religious organisation”.

“JKLF is a caravan of firm believers in Allah and true lovers of Prophet Mohammad. So many people at times have tried to malign JKLF and its leaders by false propaganda and bundles of lies. JKLF and its members love and respect every deed of our beloved prophet but we don’t believe in claiming ourselves as the only righteous and devout Muslims and dismissing all others as bad ones. Almighty Allah alone could decree on it”, said the JKLF statement with a dig on Geelani and his fold.

“JKLF considers the issue of Jammu Kashmir as a political issue and our struggle is for every citizen of Jammu and Kashmir as we do not believe in discriminating people on the basis of their caste, religion, creed or color. JKLF has in the past remained silent in the larger interests of the Ummah and our nation but when our ‘well-wishers’ start to put these controversies in books, we have every right to defend ourselves and put the historical facts in right perspective”. It cautioned the writers and columnists publishing subjective reviews on Geelani’s book against rewriting the history for vested interests or ideology.

JKLF asserted that many of the serving and retired government employees had begun to write and publish reviews and commentaries only to extol the authors of their liking often without reading a book. Without mentioning a name, it wished the review writers to reach their conclusions only after reading the parallel facts and arguments and assessing the issues, events and personalities in totality.

Much significantly, JKLF indicated that Geelani and his bunch of relatives had influenced and imposed MUF’s policies and decisions in 1986-87. It announced that JKLF would soon come up with a publication that would make it clear whether the decision of the entry of MUF’s four MLAs in Assembly, in 1987, was contrary to the MUF’s decision. It suggested that Geelani had imposed his own writ plus that of his son-in-law Altaf Fantoosh and another relative, advocate Hissam-ud-din. It asserted that the rejoinder would also unravel other significant facts and make it clear whether the four MUF MLAs, including Geelani, had resigned in 1989 on the call of their conscience or under the pressure of militants and the people of Kashmir.

Within his trademark attacks on the Indian security forces, Police and the local counterinsurgents, Geelani has lashed out in the book on a particular breed of militants. Without directly holding JKLF responsible for accommodating such cadres in its ranks, Geelani has written that a number of people, including criminal elements and cinema ticket sellers, had picked up the gun only to pursue their menial goals and vested interests. According to him, such illiterate and uneducated people had no knowledge of Kashmir’s history and no concept of either the religion or the Azadi.

Geelani’s comments about the slain separatist leader and founder of Peoples Conference, Abdul Gani Lone, have also generated bitter reaction among the latter’s followers and successors, though none of them has still come out with a rejoinder in media.

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