KL NEWS NETWORK
SRINAGAR
Former Union Minister and senior Congress leader Prof Saif ud Din Soz on Thursday said that revocation of AFSPA could be first step to “heal” Kashmiris.
“I feel intensely that if Government of India wants to respond to the grim situation created by the forces in which fifty precious lives were lost and hundreds got wounded, then, the first step would be to scrap AFSPA from the entire State of Jammu and Kashmir,” he said in a statement issued here this afternoon. “AFSPA, no doubt, is a draconian law and it has mostly been misused in the State.”
“The armed forces and para-forces have laws available to check violence of all kinds. The AFSPA only provides immunity to forces for not being accountable for any of their actions, at all! As a citizen, I felt amazed when senior functionaries of the Govt. of India, committed recently that they would explore the possibility of using lesser lethal weapons than pallet-guns, as this assertion pre-supposes that they have only to fight. They also, perhaps, meant that Government of India has nothing to do in the realm of Insaaniyat,” the statement said.
Soz added that it was his my assessment that should the Government of India take the suggested first step (Removal of AFSPA) that might create the possibility of a dialogue with the “Opinion Leaders” in Kashmir!”
