The six months of detention of the political leadership in Kashmir has been an “Orwellian nightmare”, a tweet on PDP president Mehbooba Mufti’s Twitter handle said on Wednesday.
Mehbooba’s daughter Iltija Mufti has been operating her mother’s Twitter account since September 20 following the detention of the former Chief Minister in the wake of abrogation of Article 370 on August 5 last year.
“Exactly 6 months ago, I watched helplessly as officers took my mother away. Days have turned into weeks & weeks into months. Yet, political leadership in Kashmir remains under illegal detention. It’s been an Orwellian nightmare to be up against a government muzzling its own people,” Ms. Iltija tweeted from her mother’s handle.
She said “the idea of India was under assault and staying quiet is criminal complicity.”
“Economic & psychological cost of this crisis has debilitated J&K. Yet nothing has changed. For many fellow Indians, this might be comeuppance for Kashmiris. But truth is that idea of India is under assault. And staying quiet is criminal complicity,” she said.
Ms. Iltija said she will continue speaking up as an “anguished Kashmiri.”
“I’ll continue fighting & speaking up as an anguished Kashmiri. And as a daughter, every day until my mother comes home. What makes India great is its diversity, values of equality & brotherhood. I draw strength in knowing that a mass movement has been ignited to protect these values,” she added.
Mainstream politicians, activists and trade leaders were kept under preventive detention after August 5 last year when the Centre withdrew the special status of the erstwhile state of Jammu and Kashmir and bifurcated it into union territories — Ladakh, and Jammu and Kashmir. Since then many among them have been released on different occasions.
Among the prominent leaders who are still under detention are NC leaders Farooq Abdullah and Omar Abdullah and Mehbooba Mufti.
While Farooq Abdullah has been kept at his Gupkar house, his son and NC vice president Omar Abdullah has been detained at Hari Niwas. Ms. Mehbooba, who was initially lodged at Chesmashahi huts, has been shifted to a government building in the heart of Srinagar.
Farooq Abdullah was slapped with the stringent Public Safety Act on September 17 which was further renewed for a period of three months on December 16.