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“We have detained four persons and they are being questioned,” Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP) of Rajouri district Suleman Chowdhary said today.

As precautionary measure, the authorities have imposed prohibitory orders under CrPC Section 144 in Kalakote town, he said.

Two persons were injured in Tuesday’s clash.

The SSP said that a special investigation team (SIT) has been constituted to probe the case.

He said that after the probe report is submitted, action will be taken against the accused.

Meanwhile, NC workers resorted to protest demonstrations and blocked Kalakote road over the incident and demanded withdrawal of a case against its workers.
 

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The assembly was adjourned on Monday after Opposition created ruckus over reported attacks on Gujjar Muslims in Kathua, allegedly by RSS and BJP activists.

The issue was raised by NC legislator MianAltaf as point of information as soon as Speaker started proceedings during the second sitting.

"Our Gujjar Muslims living in Kathua were attacked by RSS and BJP people. Their houses were burnt and they were beaten ruthlessly," he alleged.

The NC legislator was joined by other opposition members who demanded action against the attackers.

"Muslim brethren are not safe anywhere in India. The government should explain its position," shouted Congress legislator VikarRasool.

The opposition members expressed their anger against the PDP led government, accusing them of oppressing the Muslim community. The opposition members stormed into the Well, climbed on the Assembly Reporters’ table and shouted anti-BJP and anti-PDP slogans. They demanded action against the attackers.

The ruckus forced Speaker Kavinder Gupta to adjourn the House for half an hour.

MianAltaf said the residents of HariaChek Tehsil Mahreen in Kathua area of Jammu were attacked by RSS workers. Altaf said a 12-year old girl namely Beena D/o Shahab Din and a 35 year old man namely Siraj Din and three others were injured in firing by the attackers.

Minister for Parliamentary Affairs, Abdul RehmanVeeri, said that situation was under control in Kathua.

Giving details of the incident, the Minister said that at around 7.30 a.m on Monday some locals of village HaryaChak, district Kathua, found a head, allegedly of a cow, near the house of MaskeenGujjar resident of ChakDhariHarya, ChakRajbagh.

“As the news spread, around 200/300 members of Hindu community assembled there and held protest demonstration and also blocked the road. Soon after this one person took the cow head in possession.  Thereafter the gathering swelled up to 500/600 and they moved to HaryaChakChowk in the shape of a procession,” he said.

“On reaching HaryaChowk the gathering swelled to 700/800. Police made many attempts to stop the protesters but the protesters managed to reach HaryaChowk where around 300/400 members of Gujjar community had assembled. Stone pelting was resorted to by both the sides,” the minister said.

As the House was adjourned, the opposition legislators conducted their own proceedings with former Speaker Mubarak Gul sitting as Speaker in the Well.

Members who spoke included DavinderRana, Abdul MajeedLarmi, GM Saroori and VikarRasool.

DavinderRana said the opposition wanted to raise the concerns of people but the government has left the House. 

The mock assembly ran for 25 minutes till the ruling party members entered the House.

Courtesy: Greater Kashmir
 

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Despite Jammu and Kashmir High Court on Friday ordering the state government to release Khurram Parvez, the human rights activist is still locked up in jail owing to a “minor clerical error”.

The date of detention in the Public Safety Act warrant was wrongly mentioned as September 19, instead of September 21, said a Facebook post by the Jammu and Kashmir Coalition of Civil Society. Parvez is the programme coordinator of JKCCS and the chairperson of Asian Federation Against involuntary Disappearances.

The post said that the jail authorities stated they would require a formal corrigendum from the court before they can release Parvez. “An application for corrigendum will be urgently moved before the J&K High Court at Srinagar tomorrow,” added JKCCS. State Home Secretary RK Goel told The Indian Express that he has not received any such order to rectify the date.

Parvez was detained under the Jammu and Kashmir’s Public Safety Act on September 15, a day after he was barred from boarding a flight to Geneva from Delhi Airport for a United Nations meeting. On September 21, he was taken into preventive custody for the second time.
On Friday, the high court had termed Parvez’s detention ‘illegal’ and said that the “detaining authority had abused its powers”.

Courtesy: Scroll.in

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A quarter of a century — 25 years– after the alleged mass rape and torture at Kunan Poshpora on 23/24 February 1991, the Indian Army, through the Ministry of Defence, Union of India, has petitioned the Indian Supreme Court challenging orders of the Jammu and Kashmir High Court on investigations and compensation.
 
In December 2014, Government of Jammu and Kashmir had challenged the same High Court orders before the Supreme Court on the issue of compensation, and got a stay on the orders. The central government chose not to respond to this petition despite being given time and opportunity to do so and wasted one year of both the courts and survivors time.
 
The Supreme Court heard afresh, another petition on behalf of the Indian army on May 13, 2016, issued notice and tagged both petitions to be now heard before the court together. Besides the above two petitions in the Supreme Court, there are three petitions pending before the Jammu Kashmir High Court: one by the survivors seeking investigations and prosecution, and two by the army, against the implementation of the State Human Rights Commission recommendations in this case, and, against the police investigations ordered by the Judicial Magistrate, Kupwara on June 18, 2013.
 
Now, the Indian army has contended before the Supreme Court that the allegations of rape and torture are “a hoax orchestrated by militant groups”, “part of cleverly contrived strategy of psychological warfare”, to “discredit the security forces by indulging in false propaganda”, “with a view to jeopardize the conduct of counter insurgency operations…in the valley”, and that the numbers of men and women alleged to have been tortured and raped are against “natural human conduct”.
 
On March 3, 2016, Sabrangindia had published an account by journalist Dilnaz Boga written on the 25 year mark of the tragic events. She recalled her journey to report the incident around 2006, a decade earlier.

In this, the journalist, Boga, quotes a PRO of the Ministry of Defence in Delhi telling her around 2006 when she was exploring the story, who says “Puraney zakhm kyu khured rahey ho? (why are you bringing up old wounds?)” Shereplied that justice had not been done and the guilty were not booked. Dilnaz boga further writes, “Pushing my luck, I asked to see the files of the incident and he told me that the files were destroyed, as it had been 17 years. In the end, I explained that I was doing my job and that he should do his and hung up as his tone changed.” Finally the editor of the publication she was working for never carried the story saying it was anti-national and pro-Pakistan. The happenings in the valley, from Handwara to others, to date reveal how any effort to bring about rational discourse on the issue of human rights abuses by the Indian armed forces in Kashmit or the north east, risk being labelled as anti-national.

According to a press release issued by the Jammu and Kashmir Coalition of Civil Society (JKCCS), the army petition before the Supreme Court is the latest attempt by the State to delay proceedings and frustrate every attempt of the survivors for justice. To date, six victims of the brutal rape and torture have died.
 
In their continuing struggle for justice, the survivors of Kunan Poshpora will now submit their response before the Supreme Court and seek for investigations and prosecution of the accused army personnel.

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The ruling elite and the military establishment of Pakistan is paranoid about an independent Kashmir — and I really don’t understand why. Pakistan talks about "self–determination" as long as it means Pakistan will be able to gain. Pakistan is completely allergic to the "I" word. They have an agenda to suppress, undermine, and prevent any organized movement that begins to harness the natural aspirations of the people of Jammu & Kashmir for independent Kashmir.

Pakistan has backed groups that have a destructive approach to the freedom struggle and have a distorted agenda which exploits the name of Islam. In 1990, Pakistan realised that JKLF would not serve its selfish interests so they went to the old habits they learnt from the CIA in the Afghanistan war theatre — they backed multiple groups, most notoriously Jamaat-e-Islami and Hizbul Mujahideen and encouraged them to wipe out the pro–independence struggle while they fought India. The battle or "jihad" waged by these groups was designed to create chaos and create desperation but it never was disciplined, organized, strategic, or aimed to empower the common people of Kashmir to stand up for themselves.

Pakistan supported extremists with a Pakistani nationalistic agenda in Kashmir. It must be understood that their agenda is separate from main stream Islam and they only exploit the name of Islam for their political agenda. As such they tried to create a desperation in the Kashmiri society and force a communal revolt. There are reasons for this. An activist of Jamaat Islami once explained that they must wipe out tourism and education in order to make the common people desperate and ready for "revolution".

I never understood why in Kashmir schools were burnt or why blasts were placed in civilian, non–military zones. Why bridges were destroyed. Why Kashmiri people were kidnapped. I know of people who would have sacrificed everything for freedom who were kidnapped and told to pay so many lakhs of rupees or give their son for their organisation or be killed. Why did this happen? And why did this continue with full knowledge of the leadership of these organisations? Its absolutely inexcusable.

A Jamaat supporter once explained to me that sometimes you have to force a people to wake up and realise what is best for them. He said without jobs and education "jihad" will be the only avenue. These politicians call this creation of chaos, this self–destruction "jihad"? I call it a "facade". Do these organizations think you can call something "Islamic" and that is enough?

(T)hey manipulated and extorted. Their methods broke down political and social institutions when what was needed was a strengthening of these institutions so they might be utilised for the cause of freedom. What’s more, these organizations directly targeted JKLF boys and then they fought even among themselves. How could these organisations be expected to succeed with this type of treachery and lack of morals?

We have seen what was done to Kabul in the name of Islam — the blood of Muslims was made to run through its streets at the hands of other Muslims. Hekmatyar had a dispute with Prof. Rabbani and it resulted in the death of thousands of Afghans. Mosques were destroyed. An entire city which survived the evil Soviet onslaught was razed to the ground. This was a dispute between two Jamaat Islami supporters. And both sides called it "jihad". What’s more, the Taliban have taken their place, also in the name of Islam and also with the backing of Pakistan.

Tolerance is the epitome of Jammu and Kashmir and all the people of the state of different faiths have, do, and will live in peace with each other. And the communal flames of the last nine years have been ignited by foreign hands and have nothing to do with Kashmiri actions. And if Islam is to spread further in Jammu and Kashmir it will spread by example and by practice and according to the will of Allah— just like it did when Islam first came to Kashmir.

The truth is the people of Kashmir are sincere Muslims – meaning that they are also tolerant, positive, and caring human beings. There is a profound love for Islam and the people of Kashmir embrace tolerance and compassion towards all as part of their belief. Likewise, the people of Jammu and Kashmir are not just Muslim. In fact a significant portion of the population is Buddhist, Sikh, and Hindu. And Kashmiris have co–existed in a peaceful way for centuries.

Much to the dislike of Pakistan and pro–Pak groups, the majority of Kashmiris want re–unification and independence. And they are going to have to come to terms with this reality sooner or later. And no matter how much they cloak their rhetoric in terms of "Islam" this fact is not going to disappear.

Archived from Communalism Combat, July 1999, Year 6  No. 51, Cover Story 3

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