Centre choking breathing space for Kashmiris: PAGD

Claiming that situation in Jammu and Kashmir was deteriorating fast, People’s Alliance for Gupkar Declaration (PAGD) Saturday alleged that the BJP government at the Centre was choking the breathing space for people of the Union Territory (UT).

“After Article 370 of the Constitution was abrogated by the Centre unconstitutionally and in an undemocratic manner, now other ways of survival are being gradually choked,” CPI(M) leader and spokesman of the PAGD, Mohammad Yousuf Tarigami, said while addressing a presser here.

Flanked by PAGD chairman and National Conference president Farooq Abdullah, PDP president Mehbooba Mufti and other leaders, Tarigami alleged that civil liberties, freedom of press and freedom of expression were under assault while police stations and jails are being filled with innocent people.

“It is high time that people and the political parties of J&K must wake up and raise a collective and united voice against the onslaught of New Delhi on people here. Outside every police station, parents are waiting to see their children out. Outside jails have now no capacity given the number of people of Kashmir lodged there,” the veteran CPI(M) leader alleged.

He termed the frequent visits of Union ministers to J&K as a “move to push people of Kashmir to wall further.” Taking a jibe at Prime Minister Narendera Modi for stating that power and democracy was taken to grassroots level in J&K, Tarigami said in the Naya Kashmir document, decentralization has been prioritized and democracy was already at the grassroots level.

Regarding the voting rights to any one with authorization of the Tehsildars, the PAGD spokesman questioned that if giving voting rights is the prerogative of Election Commission, “why government was issuing orders? On the next day of order, the media is being told that the order stands withdrawn. Isn’t this a mockery of democracy?”

The PAGD, a grouping of Kashmir parties led by Farooq Abdullah which was formed in October 2020 to strive for restoration of statehood and special status of J&K.