For Yasin Malik

Yasin Malik, the charismatic leader of the Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front, is in intensive care and said to be in critical condition after being detained by Indian security forces for over three months. He has now been shifted to a hospital but his family says he has lost use of one arm. His wife Mashal is also believed to be unwell. Malik is no stranger to being a guest of the Indian state, estimating that he had been arrested more than 200 times. He has been tortured and vilified and now it seems as if India might have finally successfully managed to physically break the seemingly relentless Malik. He began his life of resistance as a student leader in the 1980s and rose to prominence in the run-up to the rigged elections of 1987, when he was arrested for the first time. It was his time in jail, where he was mercilessly tortured and interrogated, that convinced him to join the insurgency.

It is the presence of people like Malik at the forefront of the revolt which gives the lie to the Indian claim, maintained to this today, that the revolt in 1988 was not homegrown and rather directed by Pakistan. Malik was always too independent and iconoclast to accept direction from any state. After his release from prison in 1987, he joined the Hizbul Mujahideen and then become one of the main members of the JKLF. He was never a favourite of any establishment because his ultimate aim has been the independence for all of Kashmir. A four-year spell in jail from 1990 to 1994 led to a change of tactics from Malik. He renounced violence and announced an immediate ceasefire. This made him a target of not only the Indian army but also groups like the Hizbul Mujahideen. At one time or another, Malik has worked with and fallen out with just about every political leader in Kashmir, be it Mufti Saeed or Omar Abdullah. His own JKLF has splintered multiple times. But he has never given up his idealism. He has borne the indignities heaped on him by the India state with grace and charm. All lovers of liberty wish him and his wife a speedy recovery and hope they will soon return to fighting on behalf of the Kashmiri people.