Riyaz Ul Khaliq
SRINAGAR
Lashing out at unionist political parties of Jammu and Kashmir of being “reasons of slavery”, All Parties Hurriyat Conference (g) chairperson, Syed Ali Geelani, Tuesday called for complete boycott of upcoming Panchayat and Local Bodies Elections in state.
Addressing a seminar to mark January 05 United Nations Resolution on Kashmir, Hurriyat patriarch said, “people need to know the costs of their votes. India has been exploiting it for her ends.”
Recently, he said, Maleeha Lodhi of Pakistan raised issue of Kashmir in UN, however, “Indian envoy responded saying Kashmiris vote in local elections”.
“Casting votes in elections has been a big hurdle in our fight to freedom,” he said asking the audience to start campaign in their areas. “Make people understand that casting votes are detrimental in our struggle.”
Lauding those who attended the today’s seminar, Geelani said, “it is despite that Hurriyat Conference had not made any public announcement about the program but your coming here is a big thing.”
Lashing out at National Conference for its “munafiqat”, Hurriyat patriarch said, “these days they are issuing long statements, give long speeches criticizing Mufti Sayeed, giving an impression that they are better than PDP.”
“They are dual faced; Kashmiris know what they did when they were in power. They killed 125 youth in 2010. Arrested, tortured Kashmiris and people are not fools not to understand what they are doing now.”
Asking those who supported PDP in elections to ponder what they achieved as PDP and NC are two sides of same coin, Geelani said, “some people would say PDP is better than NC, now I ask them to comment about the ruling government. Have arrests, detentions, and torture stopped.”
“The answer is no.”
While giving the historic background of United Nations resolutions on Kashmir, Geelani said, “our slavery started the day National Conference was created.”
“When NC was created with the help of Indian National Congress,” he said, “ring of slavery was put into the neck of Kashmiris.”
He asked people to make introspection when they follow a leader. “People followed a leader not principles that is why we are slaves,” he said asking people to examine anyone before following his/her directions.
Asserting that the sub-continent was divided on the basis of “two Nation Theory”, Geelani said, “let me make it clear that Tribals who came to Kashmir to help us did not follow the directions (of their leaders).”
“They took a different route,” he said adding, “but we must not forget the vicious role played by National Conference then.”
It was Maqbool Sherwani, he said, who diverted tribals from their real cause. “Tribals were supposed to reach airport but they were shown a wrong route. I am eye witness how NC facilitated killing of Sikhs.”
