Delhi treated NC’s resolution of releasing prisoners with contempt: Geelani

‘Coalition just a puppet regime; Police taking diktats directly from Centre’

Ahmed Ali Fayyaz

SRINAGAR, Jan 10: Separatist hardliner Syed Ali Shah Geelani today dismissed the National Conference- Congress coalition government as a puppet regime and claimed that Police were taking diktats directly from New Delhi so as to continue “excesses and atrocities” on the Kashmiris. After a month-long hustle and bustle in the Valley, Geelani has also called for a total shutdown in Jammu & Kashmir on January 15^th.

Unceremoniously marginalized at the end of five-month-long mass agitation in the Valley, Syed Ali Shah Geelani held a well attended news conference at his Hyderpora residence. Building maximum possible pressure on the state authorities for seeking release of political detainees, particularly High Court Bar Association President Mian Abdul Qayoom and Dukhtaraan-e-Millat Chairperson Asiya Andrabi, appeared to be the main objective of the Hurriyat (G) patriarch.

While addressing the news conference, Geelani alleged that Police were persisting with their “reign of terror” in the Valley as there was no accountability in the law enforcing authorities. He said that Police and other security agencies were relentlessly committing excesses and atrocities on the hapless Kashmiris, notwithstanding an uneasy calm. He asserted that Police were directly taking diktats from the Union Home and Defence Ministries, without regard to the state authority.

“National Conference’s Working Committee passed the resolution of releasing all political prisoners in the month of July last year. It has been summarily rejected and treated with contempt by the Government of India”, Geelani said. He further pointed out that even the public declarations of the Centre’s J&K interlocutors had not resulted in the release of the political prisoners. He alleged that jail authorities were meting out inhuman treatment to the detained separatist activists in brazen violation of all jail manuals.

Lashing out at Police and security forces further, Geelani said that these agencies were leaving no stone unturned to revive armed insurgency that, according to him, provided the strongest justification for presence of huge size of troops in the state. He claimed that current drawing room slogan of “khoon ka badla June mein lenge” was the creation of Police and other government agencies who, he insisted, had developed vested interest in the bloody turbulence. He alleged that Police had discovered a “gold mine” in arresting Kashmiri youth and subsequently releasing them against cash payments.

“So many youngsters tell me that the Government was not allowing them to continue their political activity through democratic means. But, I always caution them against falling in the trap of the Government agencies who desperately want guns to roar”, Geelani asserted. “It’s all part of a well planned strategy”, he added. He claimed that constituting panels and fielding interlocutors were exercises in futility as none of them had mandate to resolve the real political dispute. “We will live on leaves of the trees but will never compromise on the Indian occupation in Jammu & Kashmir”, Geelani asserted.

Asked about BJP’s plans of hoisting the Indian national flag on the Clock Tower in Lalchowk on occasion of the Republic Day on January 26^th, Geelani said that it was no act of gallantry to do it under the protection of one million troopers. He asked people of all parts of the state to observe total shutdown against “continuing excesses and atrocities” by Police and security forces on January 15^th. This type of calls from Geelani, as also from Muslim League activist Massarat Aalam, who was finally arrested in September last year, had frozen the Valley for five long months from June to October 2010.

However, the situation changed dramatically in the months of September and October, following which Geelani’s shutdown calls had very limited impact. He has also abandoned his weekly shutdown calendars that were the main feature of last years’ mass agitation in Kashmir.

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ET IMPACT

Sayeed Khan is now head of GAD, Vyas Principal Secretary to CM

Early Times Report

SRINAGAR, Jan 10: Taking immediate cognizance of the Early Times report, that appeared on January 9^th, Government of Jammu and Kashmir today updated the official website of General Administration Department www.jkgad.nic.in and made necessary corrections in the designations of Indian Administrative Officers.

Pathetically, the link containing information about 100-odd IAS officers of J&K Cadre had never been updated since January 18, 2010. It even described Commissioner-Secretary of GAD, Mohammad Sayeed Khan, as “Secretary Social Welfare” though he had been long back relieved by Mr Jeet Lal and had taken over as head of GAD in August 2010. He was among dozens of senior bureaucrats and officials who had been shifted to new places on August 26, 2010.

Thanks to the correction made today, Bharat Bhushan Vyas has been correctly mentioned as Principal Secretary to Chief Minister and Khursheed Ahmed Ganai as Principal Secretary Planning.

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BB Vyas is Commissioner Planning, Khursheed Ganai Principal Secretary to CM !

J&K Govt’s special information for IAS officers without an RTI application

Ahmed Ali Fayyaz

SRINAGAR, Jan 8: General Administration Department (GAD) is officially responsible not only for maintaining service record of KAS and IAS officers but also for sharing with the public every information about these public servants. Imagine what this custodian of all such authentic information is telling the world at large through its official website www.jkgad.nic.in on January 8^th, 2011.

State government’s most authentic domain on the Internet mentions head of the GAD itself, Mohammad Sayeed Khan, as Secretary to Government, Social Welfare Department. According to it, Bharat Bhushan Vyas is Commissioner-Secretary Planning Department and Khursheed Ahmed Ganai is Principal Secretary to Honourble Chief Minister. This inspite of the fact that Khan had been appointed as Secretary GAD on August 26, 2010---the day Vyas and Ganai swapped places in a major reshuffle in the state bureaucracy.

The GAD website, being maintained by NIC, further mentions S S Sawhny as Principal Resident Commissioner in New Delhi and Gowhar Ahmed as Member J&K Special Tribunal. Mr Sawhny has actually reached superannuation on 31-12-2010 and Mr Gowhar on May 31 last year. On the GAD website, Chairman J&K Special Tribunal, Samuel Varghese, has been mentioned as Financial Commissioner Home, Principal Secretary Home B R Sharma as Principal Secretary Power Development Department, Mehboob Iqbal, who had been attached to GAD on 26-8-2010, has been described as Commissioner-Secretary R&B and Excise Commissioner G A Pir as Secretary School Education.

Divisional Commissioner of Kashmir Asgar Hassan Samoon has been designated as Commissioner-Secretary CAPD and Transport and actual head of CAPD, Pradeep Gupta, has been introduced as Excise Commissioner.

Senior bureaucrats in Chief Secretary’s office as well as GAD did not respond to phone calls but their juniors, on the condition of anonymity, told Early Times that nobody in the Civil Secretariat had bothered to update information about 100-odd IAS officers in the last 12 calendar months. The list of J&K cadre IAS officers, as available on the most authentic website of the state government, has been compiled on 18-01-2010. Interestingly, however, the list of the state’s KAS officers is well up to date.

“Khursheed Ganai Sahab, alongwith Asgar Hussain (now in CM’s Secretariat) and others, not only created the GAD domain in 2006-07 but also kept it religiously updated every day. His successor Basharat Sahab was terribly keen in other practical achievements for the services but still made it a point to keep the latest information available for the common people. Sayeed Khan Sahab is believed to have never visited this site, let alone updating it”, said a middle rung official in GAD. He was, however, quick to make it clear that the responsibility of maintaining and updating the links lay with NIC. “Yes Khan Sahab and others seeking extension in services in the department should have alerted the NIC and made it update all links”, he admitted.

“How do you except bureaucrats and officials to update information about IAS officers when both, National Conference as well as PDP, have been seeking their expulsion from the state?” asked a former Minister with a veiled reference to the two major political parties’ slogans of “Greater Autonomy” and “Self Rule”. He asserted that there was no political will to make the defunct State Accountability Commission and the non-existent State Information Commission operational in Jammu & Kashmir. “It’s ridiculous that the government found only one individual (Wajahat Habibullah) suitable to head SIC and not a single individual after Justice (R.P) Sethi’s resignation fit to head SAC in this country of 110 Crore population”, he observed, with a dig on the two-year-old NC-Congress coalition.

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Tral shuts over arrest of Hizb District Commander’s sister

Police says she collected Rs 5 Lakh for militants from a man in Dadsar

Ahmed Ali Fayyaz

SRINAGAR, Jan 7: For the first time in the last many months, Police have arrested a woman on charges of working as a financial conduit for militants of Hizbul Mujahideen. Tral township in the south Kashmir district of Pulwama today observed shutdown even as demonstrators clashed with Police, described the detainee as innocent and demanded her release.

Authoritative sources revealed to Early Times that a 24-year-old unmarried woman, namely Surraya D/o Ghulam Mohiuddin Dar of Tral was under the Police surveillance ever since she had figured as an “overground activist” of the militants of Hizbul Mujahideen militants last year. The other day only, Police received specific information according to which she had collected a sum of Rs 5 Lakh from a militant financial conduit at Dadsar village on January 5^th. On January 6^th, men from Police Station Tral conducted a raid on her house and got her arrested.

Surraya happens to be the sister of Hizbul Mujahideen’s “District Commander” for Tral, Sajjad Ahmed Dar, who, according to official sources, has been operating as a militant commander for the last several years and continues to be a top wanted militant. When the inmates offered resistance, Police convinced them and also permitted her sister-in-law, Mubeena W/o Tanvir Ahmed Dar, to accompany and stay with her at the Police Station. Last evening, hundreds of residents began protesting Surraya’s arrest with the argument that she was innocent and, as such, had no involvement with her brother’s organization or political ideology.

 Over a thousand people today took to the streets and staged protest against Surrauay’s arrest. They demanded her immediate release from Police lock up. The demonstrators reportedly shouted slogans and enforced shutdown in the township. Some people working at bakery shops complained that the demonstrators meted out to them ‘rude behaviour’ when they refused to shut their shops.

Police and CRPF forced the demonstrators to disperse with baton charge and tearsmoke. Reports said that ding dong clashes continued on the streets for over an hour. However, shopkeepers left for their respective residences and did not turn up back to open their businesses.

SP Awantipore, Mohammad Irshad, confirmed to Early Times that Surraya was under the Police scanner for quite some time. He also confirmed official reports that Surraya had collected Rs 5 Lakh from a man in Dadsar. He said that the matter was under investigation and Police would soon launch a manhunt to arrest the civilian, who, according to SP, was a Hizb financial conduit.

SP said that no money had been recovered or seized on Thursday or Friday. He said it was a routine matter of a woman’s involvement in arranging and distributing money among the militants. “There is proper women Police bandobust at the Police Station but still we have allowed one of her female relatives to stay with her. There’s no question of her release till recovery of the money besides identification and arrest of other members of the Hizb financial chain”, SP Mohammad Irshad said.  He said that Surraya had been arrested under law and FIR No: 5 of 2011 dated 6-1-2011, under sections 17, 21 and 40 (Unlawful Activities Act stood registered against her at the local Police Station.

SP Irshad said that Surraya confessed to her involvement but she maintained in two rounds of her sustained interrogation till late tonight that “an unidentified person” had passed on the money to her and another “unidentified persons” had collected the same from her on Thursday. However, an independent version was not available immediately.

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Over 2,000 unauthorised appointments made in Local Bodies in 2009 and 2010


Tangmarg protests land lease to pvt cellphone company

Ahmed Ali Fayyaz

SRINAGAR, Jan 5: Leasing out a piece of prime land to a private
cellphone company by Municipal Committee Tangmarg today evoked a
protest as residents and traders demanded construction of a shopping
complex or any other public utility on the site. Demonstrators leveled
serious allegations of corruption and unfair means against the
Executive Officer and said that the public servant had been serving
the politicians, not the masses. Meanwhile, Early Times has collected
documentary evidence to establish that in addition to 5,000 illegal
appointments in 2002-06 period, nearly 2,000 people have been
appointed in different municipal bodies in the state during Mr Omar
Abdullah’s government in 2009 and 2010 without any authority and
competence through backdoor.

Residents and shopkeepers today protested against Tangmarg Municipal
Committee Executive Officer Ghulam Rasool Shah’s activity in the
matter of leasing out a piece of prime land near Gole Market to a
private telecommunications company allegedly on kickbacks. They
complained that Shah had been serving the interest of certain
politicians who were hand-in-glove with officials of the cellphone
company in usurping the prime land. They demanded Housing and Urban
Development Department and Tourism Department to raise a shopping
complex or any other public utility facility at the proposed site of a
cellphone tower.

“Shah has spent most of his time in arranging NOCs and other documents
for a building complex that has come up ahead of J&K Bank branch on
Tangmarg-Gulmarg Road in 2009-10 and belongs to an influential
politician”, one of the shopkeepers, namely Ghulam Mohammad Bhat,
said. He alleged that Shah was presently making all preparations of
the illegal allotment of a restaurant in favour of the politician. He
said that Tangmarg Municipal Committee had completed construction of
the restaurant at Gulmarg with the expenditure of Rs 45 Lakh.

Bhat further complained that one particular builder, namely Javed
Math, was currently raising another unauthorized complex near J&K Bank
branch and it was also being constructed for the local politicians. He
claimed that there was no permission for these constructions from the
competent authority.

Director Local Bodies, Kashmir, Farooq Reenzu, did not respond to
repeated phone calls but officials at the Directorate confirmed that
papers of none of the said structures had been forwarded for necessary
approval.

Meanwhile, Early Times has managed to collect specific details and
documentary evidence of 60 illegal and unauthorized appointments which
have been made clandestinely by two Executive Officers and President
of Kunzar Municipal Committee in the year 2010 against cash payment of
Rs 2.00 Lakh from each beneficiary. While as former Executive Officer
Kunzar Municipal Committee (a town on Srinagar-Tangmarg Road), Imtiyaz
Ahmed Dar has made 49 of such fraudulent appointments, his successor
Ghulam Rasool Shah (now posted as Executive Officer Tangmarg Municipal
Committee) has made 10 appointments.

Those fraudulently appointed by Imtiyaz Ahmed Dar include his wife,
Parveena Akhtar, who has been appointed as Computer Assistant in
November 2009 but shown to have been appointed in 2007. She has not
attended her office even for a single day.

During his yearlong tenure as Executive Officer of Kunzar Municipal
Committee from November 2009 to November 2010, Gh Rasool Shah has
appointed 10 persons. He has personally issued orders of appointment
in favour of two persons, namely Aatifaq Ahmed Mir and Azad Ahmed
Bhat. He has fraudulently recorded “approval” of former President of
Kunzar Municipal Committee Abdul Kareem Dar six months after the
latter expired his term in March 2010. Dar has been given a particular
share in lieu of putting his signatures. Those illegally appointed by
Shah include his brother-in-law Irshad Ahmed Shah, brother’s
sister-in-law Aaliya Assad and relatives of some employees of KMC.

Officials at Finance Department as well as Housing and Urban
Development Department at Civil Secretariat in Jammu told Early Times
that there was “blanket ban” on such appointments and there was no
question of such recruitments during Omar Abdullah-led coalition
government in 2009 and 2010. They asserted that stringent action would
be initiated against the officials involved in such fraudulently made
appointments. They made it clear that neither the Presiding Officer of
a municipal body nor Executive Officers, Secretaries and other
officials were competent by law to issue such orders or make any
payments as salary to such illegally engaged persons.

Deputy Chief Minister and Minister incharge Housing and Urban
Development Department, Tara Chand, too did not respond to phone calls
but officials in his Personal Section said that 5,000 illegal
appointments had been made by different Executive Officers,
Secretaries and Administrators during PDP-Congress regime in 2002-08
and a detailed inquiry was already underway. They too claimed that no
illegal appointments had been made in 2009 and 2010.

However, Early Times is in possession of documentary evidence to prove
that in addition to 5,000 unauthorised appointments in Mufti Sayeed’s
and Ghulam Nabi Azad’s government, over 2,000 fresh illegal
appointments have been made fraudulently in around 100 municipal
bodies all over the state in Mr Omar Abdullah’s government in 2009 and
2010. Unauthorised appointments made in Kunzar Municipal Committee in
2009 and 2010 are being published as a sample for the Government’s as
well as peoples’ information from tomorrow.

END

Prof Gani’s ‘truth’ stirs hornets’ nest in separatist camp

Guerrilla groups call him “Indian agent”; Geelani camp tightlipped

Ahmed Ali Fayyaz

SRINAGAR, Jan 3: Hardliner Syed Ali Shah Geelani, his political alma mater Jamaat-e-Islami, his seven-year-old Tehreek-e-Hurriyat as well as his faction of the Hurriyat Conference today did not react to the senior separatist leader Prof Abdul Gani Bhat’s admission that most of the Kashmiri intellectuals and politicians had been eliminated by none other than Kashmiri militants. A number of radical guerrilla groups, however, dismissed Bhat as an “Indian agent” and charged him with committing “sabotage of the freedom movement”.

Local news agency, KNS, reported that someone who identified himself as Samee-ul-Haq and claimed that he was the spokesman of an alliance of three guerrilla outfits---Al-Nasireen, Farzandan-e-Millat and Shuhada Brigade---called it on telephone and reacted sharply to Prof Gani’s statement. At a JKLF-sponsored seminar here yesterday, Prof Gani had stated that Kashmiri intellectuals and political leaders like Mirwaiz Maulvi Farooq, Abdul Gani Lone and Prof Abdul Ahad Wani had been killed by “none other than our own people”. According to him, Indian armed forces or Police had no involvement in these assassinations.

In the last 21 years of armed insurgency in Kashmir, Hurriyat Conference and all other separatist and militant groups have held the Indian forces, intelligence agencies and Police responsible for each and every civilian killing. This is for the fist time that an insider has spilled the beans and asserted in unambiguous terms that “our own people (militants), not Indian forces or Police”, have gunned down intellectuals, religious scholars and politicians like Mirwaiz Farooq, Ab Gani Lone and Prof Ahad Wani.

According to KNS, the militant alliance spokesman described Prof Gani as a “saboteur” of the Valley’s separatist movement and alleged that the “task of sabotaging the freedom movement has been assigned to him by none other than India”. The spokesman said that everybody in Kashmir knew it well as to who killed whom and why. “Generating a public debate over it would only be harmful to the freedom movement”. He warned Prof Gani to desist from causing damage to the “freedom struggle” and said that the Hurriyat leader’s ‘anti-movement machinations’ were no secret for the militant alliance.

The spokesman attributed Prof Gani’s utterances to the latter’s animosity with Geelani and warned that he would not be allowed to cause any more damage to the Kashmiri’s “freedom struggle”.

In a separate statement, officiating Chairperson of Dukhtaraan-e-Millat, Rifat Fatima, labeled Prof Gani as well as his Hurriyat colleague, Bilal Gani Lone, as “Indian agents” and alleged that both were working for the “Indian agencies” with the sole motive of causing damage to the Kashmiris’ “freedom struggle”. She said that both the Hurriyat leaders had been exposed with their own “anti-movement statements” on Sunday. She further alleged that seminars like that of JKLF yesterday were being organized by the “Indian agencies” only to harm the “freedom struggle”. The real freedom leaders, she said, were not being allowed by the government to assemble or utter a word, let alone addressing seminars.

Significantly, there was immediately no reaction to Prof Gani’s statement from his bete noire, Syed Ali Shah Geelani, his political alma mater, Jamaat-e-Islami, his current organisation, Tehreek-e-Hurriyat, or his faction of the Hurriyat Conference. Prof Gani’s obvious target---formidable militant outfit Hizbul Mujahideen, that in 1990s faced allegations of killing Mirwaiz Farooq and Prof Wani---also did not make comment till late tonight. Observers were still expecting a bitter reaction from Hizbul Mujahideen and Muzaffarabad-based militant alliance United Jihad Council.

Meanwhile, Prof Gani today told NDTV that he firmly stood by whatever he had spoken at the JKLF seminar on Sunday. He maintained that he had told the gathering a ‘truth’ which he would not withdraw under any threat or pressure.

END

Hurriyat leader Prof Gani tells ‘truth’ after 21 years

‘Our own militants killed Mirwaiz Farooq, Ab Gani Lone, Dr Ahad Wani etc’

Ahmed Ali Fayyaz

SRINAGAR, Jan 2: Separatist amalgam Hurriyat Conference’s senior leader and former Chairman, Prof Abdul Gani Bhat, today dropped a veritable bombshell when he said at a JKLF seminar that it were Kashmiri militants, not the Indian Army or Police, who had killed intellectuals and leaders like Mirwaiz Maulvi Mohammad Farooq, Abdul Gani Lone and Prof Abdul Ahad Wani. He said that he had advised Valley’s traders not to respond to calls of some radical leaders but they ‘unfortunately’ observed shutdown for five long months of year 2010 and multiplied the miseries of the Kashmiris.

Five years after telling some naked truths of Kashmir’s separatist movement at a function organized on the premises of ‘Azad Jammu & Kashmir Assembly’ at Muzaffarabad, founder-leader of Hurriyat in 1993 and founder-Chairman of Muslim United Front in 1986, Prof Abdul Gani Bhat, today disclosed publicly in Srinagar that most of the Kashmiri intellectuals, scholars, clergymen and political leaders had been eliminated by none other than “our own people”. Addressing JKLF-sponsored seminar on 20^th death anniversary of then Professor at Department of Law, Kashmir University, and a separatist ideologue, Prof Abdul Ahad Wani, Gani directly held the Kashmiri militants responsible for killing men like Awami Action Committee Chairman, Mirwaiz Maulvi Mohammad Farooq, Hurriyat’s founder member and Chairman of Peoples Conference, Abdul Gani Lone, and Prof Abdul Ahad Wani.

“Lone Sahib, Mirwaiz Farooq and Prof Wani were not killed by Army or police. They were targeted by our own people. Story is long one but we have to tell the truth,” he said. He said that the Kashmiri politicians and militants had started the separatist movement with “killing our own intellectuals”. “Was Prof Wani martyr of brilliance or martyr of rivalry, we must ask ourselves today”, Prof Gani said.

Prof Gani, who played most important role in launching MUF as well as Hurriyat after teaching Persian language and literature for more than 25 years at Government Degree College Sopore, is famous for his style of making sensational revelations. He had jumped into active politics and launched MUF after then Governor Jagmohan terminated his service for ‘preaching secessionism’ and becoming ‘threat to the nation’s security’. Even when he was operating as a senior Hurriyat leader, militants---allegedly of Hizbul Mujahideen---had gunned down Prof Bhat’s brother at his residential village of Botengo in Sopore-Bandipore belt.

Prof Bhat’s sensational revelation came very much in the presence of the two slain leaders’ sons---Mirwaiz Umar Farooq and Bilal Gani Lone--- who remained tightlipped and did not react to their senior colleague’s assertion. Some of the family members and relatives of the slain academic Prof Wani were also in attendance at the seminar. They too remained noncommittal.

Prof Bhat’s disclosures, coming first time from a senior Hurriyat’s mouth, are significant in the sense that he and invariably all of his separatist colleagues and militant outfits have been holding the Indian security forces responsible for all of these assassinations. Bhat asserted in unambiguous terms today that neither the Indian armed forces nor the state Police were involved in such killings.

Influential cleric-politician, Mirwaiz Farooq, had been gunned down by unidentified assassins at his Nageen residence on May 21, 1990. Prof Ahad Wani was kidnapped by some gunmen from KU’s Department of Law on January 2, 1991, and hours later his bullet-riddled body was spotted at a deserted place outside the university premises where Professors’ Colony has now come up in the last few years. Once a Minister and MLA from Handwara, Lone was gunned down at Mirwaiz Farooq’s 12rth death anniversary function at Eidgah Grounds on May 21, 2002. All the three killings happened in broad daylight.

Taking potshots on the separatist hardliner Syed Ali Shah Geelani and “the journalists and columnists who catapulted him to a meteoric rise”, Prof Bhat asserted that many of the Valley’s politicians and intellectuals had made the life of ordinary Kashmiris miserable. “On one hand, he (Geelani) refuses to talk to India and on the other hand he takes pleasure in meeting with the Indian Parliamentarians. These dichotomies and contradictions have to go. When we initiated talks with New Delhi, we were labeled as Kafir (non-believers) and when you talk, it’s no problem!” he said.

Prof Bhat made yet another sensational disclosure that during the thick of last year’s street demonstrations and unending shutdowns, he had implored the Valley traders not to listen to calls from radicals but it was “utterly unfortunate” that they multiplied the miseries of the hapless Kashmiris by keeping their businesses shut for five long months. He cautioned that emotion-driven acts and decisions would lead the Kashmiris to nowhere.

Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, Bilal Gani Lone, JKLF Chairman Yasin Malik, Dean University of Kashmir Prof Noor Ahmed Baba, Pediatrician Dr Altaf , Dr Zaffar Mehdi and Jamiat Ahli Hadees chief Maulana Shaukat Shah and eminent lawyer Zaffar Shah were among a large numbers of speakers on the occasion. Almost all of them demonized the Indian state as oppressor and suppressor and asserted that all of the Kashmiris were for separation from India. Malik referred to some recent incidents of “attacks” on Mirwaiz and other separatist leaders and claimed that the Indian intellectual opinion was fast turning in favour of the Kashmiris and “their just struggle for Azadi”.

END