JAMMU: Rehamatullah, 25, a young activist from Jammu and Kashmir’s Dessa Bhatta of Doda, was booked under the PSA on charges of being an alleged “overground worker and sympathiser of militants” with his family and a member of JK legislative assembly alleging that he was targeted by the authorities for his activism.
The Wire reported that his detention under the Public Safety Act (PSA) was quashed in 2016 by JK high court.
The move follows the detention of five trade union leaders from the neighbouring Kishtwar district in Chenab Valley, who were also slapped with the PSA and taken into preventive custody for allegedly raising concerns about the health risks and environmental damage caused by power project constructions in the region.
Wire reported that the five-page dossier, which has been prepared by the Senior Superintendent of Police (Doda) and approved by deputy commissioner Doda Harvinder Singh, does not refer to any formal anti-terror charges under which Rehamatullah has been booked in the past.
The document further reads that the young activist has been booked in five FIRs (two of them for his speeches, one each for wrongful restraint, abduction and criminal trespass) and he has got bail from the courts in all the cases. It also referred to a Daily Dairy entry (No. 5 of August 2, 2024) against Rehamatullah at Doda police station.
The DD entry accused the young activist of purportedly using VPN for accessing the internet “so that his anti-national activities and his links across the border with PAK/POK based militant cannot be detected”.
Rehamatullah is the father of two minor children and the youngest among three siblings.
However, Doda MLA and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) leader, Mehraj Malik sought to link the detention of Rehamatullah under the PSA with a video interview on November 6 in which the activist had accused the Doda deputy commissioner of failing to enforce the rules governing the disposal of solid waste in the town, Wire reported.
Rehamatullah accused Doda’s municipal authorities of unscientific waste disposal, claiming it was harming residents’ health. He highlighted the 2008 Solid Waste Management Project, intended to collect waste from 17 wards and convert it into manure, but questioned why authorities, including the magistrate and pollution control board, remained silent. “This is a scam, with crores of rupees being swindled. The government must investigate,” he said.
In a separate video from September 16, Rehamatullah urged citizens to use their vote to challenge “forces of tyranny” and those undermining Jammu and Kashmir’s identity, calling for a “befitting reply” at the polls.
