JOIN USDespite the separatists’ call for complete shutdown, Independence Day celebrations passed off peacefully in Jammu & Kashmir on Saturday.
Authorities have put in place restrictions and have also snapped cellular connectivity. Shops and business establishments were closed and traffic was off the roads, while educational institutions and government offices had a holiday.
Reports said police and CRPF men had imposed restrictions on people’s movement in the old city area. Most roads and by lanes were barricaded by concertina wires to check pedestrian and vehicular movements. Similar restrictions were in place up down, where the main I-Day function was held at Bakshi Stadium.
Three-tier security arrangements were put in place in and around the Stadium where Chief Minister Mufti Mohammad Sayeed unfurled the tri-colour.Pointing out that Jammu & Kashmir rejected the two-nation theory and cast its lot with India in 1947, Chief Minister Mufti Mohammad Sayeed insisted on Saturday that the state’s special status must be maintained.
“With some conditions of accession, J&K was granted special status within Indian Union which every shade of political opinion respects and commits to protect. Be it PDP, National Conference, Congress or other regional parties, they want that Jammu and Kashmir should get the (special) status and identity within the Constitution of the country,” Mufti said in his Independence Day address. However, he said that there were some phases in Jammu and Kashmir which should not have happened.
“People of the state had refused to accept the two-nation theory propounded by Pakistan founder Mohammad Ali Jinnah and went with India in 1947. The two-nation theory was not adopted by the people of Jammu and Kashmir even before independence,” the Chief Minister said.
Mufti said people of the State have shown political maturity time and again since 1938 especially when they chose a secular, democratic India rather than a theocratic state (Pakistan).