Excelsior Correspondent
SRINAGAR, Apr 26: Reacting to National Conference (NC) president’s statement that the JKLF chief ‘preferred death over bowing before New Delhi’, Peoples Conference chairman Sajad Gani Lone asked why Farooq Abdullah was exhorting Mohammad Yasin Malik to sacrifice and not his son Omar Abdullah, who is NC vice-president.
Dr Abdullah on Thursday, while addressing a rally in Kulgam had said, “Yasin Malik despite being severely ill is languishing in jail these days because he is advocating a dialogue with India but is not willing to sell self respect of Kashmiris. He has preferred death over surrender. I congratulate him for that.”
“I am not surprised by Farooq’s utterly disdainful hypocrisy but pained at the audaciousness of his utterances,” he alleged.
“Do you really have the nerve to be talking about Yasin Malik? Can you jog your memory a bit and recall that did you not as Chief Minister in 1987 chase a young rebellious Yasin Malik from being a rebel within the political system to picking up arms? Was it not you as Chief Minister who imprisoned him before and after 1987 elections? Was it not you as Chief Minister who ordered his third-degree torture and tortured him so badly that his heart ailment worsened? Was it not you as Chief Minister who put a bounty of a few lakhs on his head? Have you forgotten all that? And 32 years later you are all praise for Yasin Malik and congratulating him for going on a hunger strike and his readiness to sacrifice his life. If you are so much in love with what Yasin Malik is doing, why don’t you suggest the same to your son Omar Abdullah? Why doesn’t he go on a hunger strike and render a sacrifice as you suggest for Yasin Malik? Or are sacrifices only meant for other people’s sons?” he further alleged.
Lone alleged that Mr Farooq is singularly responsible for forcing gun on to the peace loving Kashmiri people. “Let me remind you that Yasin Malik was a part of the 1987 elections as a young member of the MUF. He was imprisoned after the rigging of 1987 elections and badly tortured. Had people like him been allowed to flourish, he may have been today where your son Omar Abdullah is. While he spent decades in jails, you and your son have prospered. He was no doubt rebellious even as a young college going student but had not lost faith in the ballot. It was your Government which rigged the elections so blatantly that Yasin and scores of others lost faith in the ballot and embraced the gun. That was the start and till date approximately one lakh Kashmiris have lost their lives, and you and your ilk continue to flourish. What a shame. Delhi should also take note that as long as they go on treating the symptoms the disease will persist and never go away”, he alleged.
Lone said that rather than punishing the victim repeatedly, Delhi should instead go after the ‘white-collar killers like Farooq Abdullah if they really want a change’.
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