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| Return of Afzal Guru's mortal remains | | Is NC suffering from amnesia? | |
Early Times Report
SRINAGAR, Aug 1: Leadership of Kashmir's oldest political party National Conference, it seems, is suffering from amnesia, if one goes by its recent demand of return of Parliament attack convict Mohammad Afzal Guru's mortal remains.
Guru was secretly hanged in New Delhi's Tihar Jail on February 9, 2013 when the Omar Abdullah-led NC-Congress coalition was ruling the state and the Abdullahs' party was a partner in the UPA in Centre too.
But now the party, which suffered humiliating defeat in the last Assembly elections, wants return of Guru's mortal remains to his family in the Valley. This political stunt, if it was designed as one, has however failed to strike a chord in the Valley.
Sources it was deliberate on the part of NC to play the Guru card, hoping that it would incite passions to regain lost public support.
On Friday, a day after Yakub Memon was hanged and his body handed over to his family in Mumbai, the NC demanded the return of the mortal remains of Afzal Guru, saying such "double standards" highlighted the "perceptions of discrimination" among the people here.
"Guru's family being deprived of his body was against the tenets of natural justice and undermined the constitutional principles of the country. The system cannot differentiate based on biased presumptions and politics and that such glaring double standards between Memon's and Guru's cases highlighted the perception of discrimination among the people of Kashmir," NCs' newly appointed chief spokesperson Aga Syed Ruhullah said.
"How can you justify not handing over the body of Guru to his family when you handed over the body of Memon to his family? The system of justice cannot have different interpretations for different people. What justice is it to deprive a young child of the dead body of his father," he said.
Sources said the decision to issue the statement on Guru was taken by Omar Abdullah himself. "Initially it was supposed to be put into Ali Mohammad Sagar's mouth but Omar wanted someone from his young team to take a lead. So Ruhullah's name was finalized," said a source privy to the development.
The NC is believed to have played the card to impress the separatist camp. "The party had thought that the idea would be endorsed by the separatists who would announce an agitation on the issue," the source said.
But the response remained so poor that even Hurriyat leaders like Syed Ali Geelani and Mirwaiz Umar Farooq refrained from joining the chorus on Guru.
While Geelani is believed to prefer silence since the day he has been given an Indian passport for a trip to Saudi Arabia, Mirwaiz equally avoided making a statement.
Sources said separatists remained silent so that NC doesn't hijack their agenda to take a lead before people. "Separatists are clever enough to lead their own campaigns than to be party to someone else's programs," said a political analyst. He said leaders like Geelani are so egoistic that they don't even support a strike call when not given by other separatists. "For that matter Omar Abdullah's move has proved childish and half-baked as usual," he added.
But the NC denies there is any politics behind the move. "We will continue to raise the demand and will exhaust all possible options to pursue this cause of justice," Ruhullah said. |
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