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| Sajjad Lone, Imran Rahi take oath of upholding India’s sovereignty and integrity | | NC’s Shariq, PDP’s Dilawar among 14 in Baramulla fray | | Ahmed Ali Fayyaz
SRINAGAR, Apr 23: Champions of ‘Azadi’ in yesteryears, Sajjad Gani Lone and Ghulam Rasool Shah alias Imran Rahi, were among 10 candidates of different political affiliations who filed their nomination papers in the North Kashmir Lok Sabha constituency of Baramulla-Kupwara while swearing by God to uphold India’s sovereignty and integrity. With both the key contestants---National Conference’s Sharief-ud-din Shariq and Peoples Democratic Party’s Mohammad Dilawar Mir---turning up for the process before Returning Officer (RO), Latief-uz-Zaman Deva, today as many as 14 candidates have filed their nomination papers in Baramulla where the process would end in the afternoon on Friday.
Chairman of a faction of late Abdul Gani Lone’s mainstream-turned-separatist Jammu & Kashmir Peoples Conference (PC), Sajjad Lone, today appeared before RO of Baramulla-Kupwara seat, Latief-uz-Zaman Deva, and filed his nomination papers. Like nine other candidates who filed their nominations for this North Kashmir constituency, Sajjad Lone took oath in the name of God of bearing true faith in the Constitution of India and upholding the sovereignty and integrity of this country. After PC’s 19-year-long struggle for Kashmir’s ‘Azadi’ (freedom from India) and seven years after his father’s assassination over the speculations of his participation in the Assembly elections of 2002, Sajjad Lone has finally stood up as a candidate in the Indian Parliamentary elections in Jammu & Kashmir.
In a news conference on April 11th, Sajjad had announced his participation in the elections with his argument that Kashmir’s separatist leadership could not afford to continue as a slave of its ostrich-like stand on the democratic exercise in which majority of the Kashmiris had participated by choice. He had, nevertheless, sought to justify it as “a change in strategy” and claimed that his ideology (of Azadi) was not going to change. Interestingly, Sajjad had outsmarted all of the Kashmiri separatist leaders and taken the lead role in running the anti-election campaign in an attempt to ensure “total boycott” to the Assembly elections in October-December 2008.
However, in total rejection of the separatist leadership’s call, nearly 61 percent people participated in the Assembly elections in J&K---71% in Jammu and 51% in Kashmir valley. Sajjad’s own sister, advocate Shabnam Lone, as also a senior ideologue in the PC, Engineer Sheikh Abdul Rasheed, contested the Assembly elections from Kupwara and Langet segments respectively. Even as Ms Lone lost to the NC candidate, Mir Saifullah, Engineer Rasheed defeated all of his rivals including NC’s incumbent, Sharief-ud-din Shariq, and PDP’s former MLA, Mohammad Sultan Panditpuri.
Those who have earlier deserted late Mr Lone’s PC and become MLAs or MLCs in the last over two decades include Maulvi Iftikhar Hussain Ansari, Muzaffar Hussain Baig, Nizam-ud-din Bhat, Abdul Haq Khan, late Bilal Lodhi (all PDP), Mohammad Akbar Lone (NC) and former Forest Minister Ghulam Mohi-ud-din Sofi. Sofi was among over a dozen members of PC who had contested Assembly elections of 2002 and came to be widely known as Sajjad’s “proxy candidates”.
It was Sofi’s and his other colleagues’ participation in the elections that caused the first split in Hurriyat in 2003 when hardliner Syed Ali Shah Geelani took a tough stand and sought PC’s ouster from the amalgam. Creation of the Geelani and Mirwaiz Umar factions in Hurriyat was the result of this particular development.
A prominent constituent of the separatist conglomerate, Hurriyat Conference, since 1993, PC has been struggling for J&K’s separation from India and creation of an Independent, sovereign state. Al-Barq came to be known as PC’s “guerrilla wing” in 1990 as most of its cadres had been late Mr Lone’s associates.
Even after Sajjad has jumped into the election bandwagon and his turnaround has evoked bitter reaction from several militant and separatist political groups, his elder brother, Bilal Gani Lone, is continuing as Chairman of the PC faction which has been a Hurriyat (Mirwaiz faction) constituent since 2003.
Those who filed their nomination papers in Baramulla today, included Ghulam Rasool Shah alias Imran Rahi of J&K Awami National Conference (ANC), who had operated as a senior commander with Hizbul Mujahideen for several years before his historic meeting with then Home Minister of India, S B Chauhan, in March 1996. A resident of Diver Anderbug village of Lolab valley in Kupwara district, Rahi was functioning as Hizbul Mujahideen’s “Deputy Chief” when he had initiated a dialogue process with the Goverenment of India alongwith nine other militant leaders, notably late Bilal Lodhi (then Chief Commander of Al-Barq), Firdaus Sayeed alias Babar Baddar (then Chief Commander of Muslim Janbaz Force) and a Muslim Mujahideen leader, late Ghulam Mohi-ud-din Lone.
Rahi had later participated in the Assembly elections of 2002 from his home segment of Kupwara but got only 366 out of 34,093 valid votes polled in the constituency. Firdaus Sayeed was inducted as MLC when he joined Dr Farooq Abdullah’s NC. However, he has not remained associated with any party politics after his term ended several years back.
Both the key contestants in the North Kashmir constituency, NC’s Sharief-ud-din Shariq and PDP’s Mohammad Dilawar Mir, also filed their nomination papers before RO today. With today’s nominations, as many as 14 contestants are now in the fray. Filing of nominations is scheduled to end at 1500 hours tomorrow while as scrutiny would be conducted on April 25th. April 27 stands fixed as the last date for withdrawal of nominations and polling is scheduled to take place in Phase-4 of the Lok Sabha elections here on May 13th. |
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