Shutdown in IOK today on Afzal Guru’s anniversary

SRINAGAR: Complete shutdown will be observed on Sunday today to mark the 7th martyrdom anniversary of Kashmiri leader, Muhammad Afzal Guru.

Call for the shutdown has been given by the APHC Chairman, Syed Ali Gilani, Mirwaiz Umar Farooq-led Hurriyat forum, Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front and other pro-freedom leaders and organisations. They have also called for complete strike on Tuesday on the occasion of the martyrdom anniversary of another prominent liberation leader, Muhammad Maqbool Butt.

India had hanged Muhammad Afzal Guru in New Delhi’s Tihar Jail on 9th February, 2013, and Muhammad Maqbool Butt in the same jail on 11th February, 1984, for their role in Kashmir freedom movement. Their bodies remain buried on the premises of the jail.

Syed Ali Gilani, in a statement issued in Srinagar, said Muhammad Maqbool Butt, Muhammad Afzal Guru and thousands of other martyrs are real heroes of the Kashmiri people. Mirwaiz Umar Farooq-led Hurriyat forum in a statement said that the sacrifices of Maqbool Butt and Afzal Guru had got etched in the collective conscience of the Kashmiri nation striving for resolution of the Kashmir dispute.

The JKLF, in a statement in Srinagar, said that Maqbool Butt’s struggle and sacrifices represented the oppressed and subjugated humans, and Afzal Guru also treaded his path and laid down his life for a sacred cause.

Other Hurriyat leaders and organisations, including Bilal Ahmad Siddiqi, Yasmeen Raja, Khawaja Firdous Ahmad Wani, Farooq Ahmad Tawheedi, Abdul Samad Inqilabi, Mehmood Ahmed Saghar, Syed Aijaz Rehmani and Jammu and Kashmir National Front, in their statements said that the Kashmiri people would accomplish the mission of their martyrs, despite all odds.

Meanwhile, normal life continued to remain affected in the Kashmir Valley due to the military lockdown and gag on broadband and high speed mobile internet on 188th consecutive day, today. The occupation authorities have enhanced the deployment of Indian troops and police personnel in the occupied territory to prevent anti-India demonstrations on the martyrdom anniversary of Afzal Guru, today.

The High Court Bar Association in a meeting in Srinagar strongly condemned the authorities for extending the illegal detention of its President, Mian Abdul Qayoom, under draconian Public Safety Act. On the other hand, more than 120 Muslim scholars from the UK have sent the Indian Prime Minister, Narendra Modi, an open letter demanding an immediate end to the India-imposed lockdown in Indian Occupied Kashmir (IOK).

The scholars urged the Indian prime minister to outline a timetable for an early implementation of the UN resolutions on Kashmir, ensure the immediate lifting of the curfew in occupied Kashmir and allow the international media access to occupied Kashmir.

They also demanded setting up of an independent international tribunal to investigate crimes against humanity being perpetrated by Indian troops in the occupied territory.