10 held under UAPA in J&K crackdown on protests over Yasin Malik's sentencing

SRINAGAR: Protests in the run-up to Kashmiri separatist and JKLF chief Yasin Malik getting concurrent life terms in a terror funding case descended into "anti-national" sloganeering and "hooliganism" outside his Srinagar house on Wednesday, prompting J&K police to arrest 10 people overnight under the stringent Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act.
Some more people involved in the commotion, including stone-pelting, have been identified and will be arrested soon, the police said.
The incident took place in the city's Maisuma neighbourhood, where Malik has a house. Parts of Srinagar, including the JKLF chairman's locality and Lal Chowk, were almost shut through the day in response to a call by organisations protesting his conviction and sentencing for funding terrorist activity and waging war against the state. Shops and business establishments elsewhere in the Valley were open.
A police statement said stone-pelting and anti-India slogans were reported even before a special NIA court in Delhi pronounced the maximum possible sentence against Malik for terror funding, rejecting claims about him turning over a new leaf and following Gandhian ideals since giving up the gun in 1994.
Police teams fanned out into various Srinagar localities for midnight raids on places where the suspected troublemakers were hiding. The man who led the group was among those arrested and charged under sections 13 of the UAPA and 120B (criminal conspiracy), 147 and 148 (rioting), 149 (unlawful assembly), 336 (act endangering life) and 34 (common intention) of the IPC.
Sources said the "main instigators" would possibly face charges under the Public Safety Act and be sent to jails outside J&K, as had been done in the case of many political activists arrested in the wake of Article 370 being nullified to remove the erstwhile state's special status in 2019.
"It is strongly reiterated that no attempt at creating/reviving law and order situations in Srinagar will be tolerated. Further, all mischievous attempts at provoking a law and order breach by vested interests will be dealt with the full force of law," the police said.