Farooq defends Kashmir’s ‘freedom-loving’ stone-pelters
‘A bullet for bullet policy will only deteriorate the situation.’
Olympic silver medalist and badminton sensation P.V. Sindhu is set to become a deputy collector in the Andhra Pradesh government. She will also become an IAS official under the conferred civil services quota from the revenue department where she is being posted now. In AP, retirement age of government staff is now 60 years. Sindhu was offered Group-1 officer posting by the Andhra Pradesh government after she won silver medal in Rio Olympics last year, along a hefty reward package as per the sports promotion policy. She was also offered a Group -1 job in the Telangana government, too, but, according to sources, Andhra Pradesh is ahead of its neighbour in preparing offer letter to her. Sindhu who received the offer letter last fortnight when she went to Amaravati to participate in the national women’s conference gave her acceptance letter to the government. Sindhu will be posted either in the Capital Region Development Authority to promote investments to Amaravati or in a sports body to promote young talent, sources said Farooq Abdullah on Friday rattled political circles and his own party leaders when he said that young boys were sacrificing their lives for the freedom of Kashmir. He also cautioned the Centre against efforts to suppress the political aspirations of the people in the Valley.
Addressing the party leaders, legislators and workers at a function to commemorate the second death anniversary of party general secretary Sheikh Nazir Ahmad, Farooq accused both India and Pakistan of subjugating and suppressing the people of J&K and appealed them to give Kashmiris their birth right of freedom. He said that statesmanship and sagacity demanded that the Centre should start political engagement with all stakeholders and shun the path of slapping threats on youth. Applauding the “sacrifices” of the young boys who are fighting the forces on streets, Farooq said that they did not care for their lives and wanted to see an end to subjugation. He asserted that violence could end only by dialogue with the youth and with Pakistan and bullet for bullet policy would only deteriorate the situation. Defending the stone-pelting and joining of the young to the militant ranks, he said that the government should understand their sentiments and the reasons why they were ready to die.
Senior leader from Jammu Bhim Singh also defended stone-pelters. Telangana Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao (KCR)’s decision to crush a rally by the unemployed youths on Wednesday in Hyderabad under the leadership of his one-time comrade-in arms M. Kodandaram might lead to floating of a new political party. Kodandaram, a retired political science professor from Osmania University, is the convener of the Telangana political parties’ joint action committee (T-JAC) which organised the rally.
The police clampdown on the rally and the widespread arrests of its activists has pushed the JAC to float a political party to fight the ruling Telangana Rashtriya Samithi (TRS) in the next elections. The new party in all likelihood will be led by Kodandaram and the JAC will continue thereafter as an independent body.
According to initial discussions that began only now, the new party might be launched by around 2 June 2017, the third anniversary of Telangana state. “We are forced to float a party after the government crushed our protest on Wednesday,” said an aide close to Kodandaram.
Kodandaram, who called for a bandh of all educational institutions in Telangana on Thursday to protest the foiling of the rally, is planning to go to Delhi next month to submit a memorandum to President Pranab Mukherjee on “the undemocratic atmosphere in Telangana”. The visit will be after the resumption of Parliament’s budget session on 9 March, sources said.
Kodandaram, along with dozens of his JAC office bearers and 3,200 youth across Telangana, was arrested since daybreak on 22 February and all roads to the rally venue, Indira Park on Lower Tank Bund in the city, were closed till evening. Kodandaram called for the