Indian atrocities in IHK shameful: Arundhati Roy

Says Kashmiris struggle can’t be suppressed even
if army increased from 0.7m to 7 million

SRINAGAR: Indian writer and journalist Arundhati Roy said on Monday that Indian atrocities in Held Kashmir were shameful as the Indian government could not suppress the indigenous movement of Kashmiris even the number of army was increased from 0.7 million to 7 million, the Indian media reported.

Under attack over her statements on Kashmir, Arundhati Roy said she only spoke what “millions of people” in Kashmir had been saying everyday for years. “Pity the nation that has to silence its writers for speaking their minds,” Ms Roy said in a statement from Srinagar where she is on a visit.

“Pity the nation that needs to jail those who ask for justice while communal killers, mass murderers, corporate scamsters, looters, rapists, and those who prey on the poorest of the poor, roam free,” she said.

Her statement came against the backdrop of the government contemplating action against her and hard-line Hurriyat leader Syed Ali Shah Geelani under charges of sedition and seeking legal opinion in this regard.

Ms Roy made two speeches in New Delhi and Srinagar in the past few days in which she sought independence for Kashmir from India. The writer said she had read in newspapers that she might be arrested on charges of sedition for her remarks supporting ‘Azadi’ for Kashmir. “I said what millions of people here say every day. I said what I as well as other commentators have written and said for years.”

“Anybody who cares to read the transcripts of my speeches will see that they were fundamentally a call for justice,” she said.