SRINAGAR (The Thursday Times) — National Conference president Farooq Abdullah’s remark that Pakistan has “saved” Kashmiris by keeping their issue alive at international forums has drawn condemnation from India’s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party and a warning from a rival Kashmiri party, while his son Omar Abdullah, chief minister of Indian-administered Jammu and Kashmir, has stayed silent.
Speaking to party workers in Baramulla on Saturday, Abdullah urged them to stay loyal to the National Conference whether or not it is in power. “If you do not remain (committed to NC), you will be erased. Even our identity will disappear. Nothing will be left,” he said, The Times of India reported. “They are silent today because there is noise in the world and our neighbour is constantly behind it. Everywhere they say ‘the decision regarding Kashmir has not been made’. That is what is saving us.”
The newspaper said his references to “they” were seen as an allusion to the Centre. As The Thursday Times reported on Saturday, Abdullah also said Pakistan was “protecting” Kashmiris and that New Delhi’s intentions towards them were not good.
“Hold on to the truth”
“Hold on to the truth. Speaking the truth is not easy, but unless you remain truthful and stand up for what is right, your future will never be secure,” the veteran leader told workers.
He also returned to the massacre of 36 Sikhs at Chittisinghpura in south Kashmir on March 20, 2000, during then US President Bill Clinton’s visit to India. Abdullah said a later judicial inquiry had found that five men accused of the killings were not the perpetrators but shopkeepers “who had been picked up by police and killed”, and claimed the inquiry judge had been “told from Delhi” not to investigate the massacre itself.
BJP calls it treason
BJP leader Ravinder Raina called the remarks “treason,” and the party has described them as “seditious and anti-national.” The BJP’s Jammu and Kashmir spokesman, Sajid Yousuf Shah, objected to Abdullah making them in Baramulla days after the October 22 anniversary of the 1947 tribal raid into Kashmir.
Imran Reza Ansari of the Peoples Conference warned Kashmiris against following Abdullah’s lead, pointing to the security laws used against ordinary residents of the region. “If a common Kashmiri speaks in a similar tone, govt will in seconds put that person in detention under PSA or UAPA. Please save your children and your families. Don’t emulate this person,” he said, referring to the Public Safety Act and the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act.
Omar Abdullah had not commented on his father’s remarks as of late Saturday, the newspaper reported.
Pakistan maintains that the Kashmir dispute must be resolved in line with United Nations Security Council resolutions and the wishes of the Kashmiri people.∎
