Muzaffarabad, Jan 5: Dozens of people marched on a main road here on Wednesday to draw the attention of international community towards the non-fulfillment of a commitment made to the people of Jammu and Kashmir more than six decades ago regarding their right to self determination.
The rally was held under the aegis of Pasban-e-Hurriyat (PH), an organization of Kashmiri refugees, to mark January 5 as ‘Right to Self Determination Day,’ to remind United Nation Security Council of the resolutions that were passed on this day in  1949.
The PB rally began from the press club and culminated outside the office of UN military observers group for India and Pakistan (UNMOGIP) where a memorandum was also presented.
However, separately, activists of National Students Federation (NSF), a pro-independence group, also took out a rally in the main old city against the January 5, 1949 resolution “because it stripped the Kashmiris of their choice to vote for an independent Kashmir,” an option offered in the earlier UN Security Council resolution of August 13, 1948.
Participants of the Pasban-e-Hurriyat rally were holding banners and placards and chanted pro-freedom slogans as they marched through the main road on a bright sunny day.
Earlier, speaking to them, Jamaat-ud-Dawa PaK chapter ameer Abdul Aziz Alvi, Jamaat-e-Islami leader Shaikh Aqeelur Rehman and PH leader Uzair Ghizali pointed out that India had itself offered to Kashmiris to decide their future status on their own free will with UN and international community standing as a guarantors to it.
However, they regretted, the commitment had not been honoured despite the passage of more than six decades.
Regarding the armed struggle in Kashmir, the speakers said the Kashmiris had always been a peaceful nation but India’s perpetual denial of their basic right had compelled them to take up arms.
They warned that if the lingering Kashmir issue was not amicably resolved at the earliest, peace in the region would remain a distant dream.
 “The unresolved Kashmir issue has staked the credibility and reputation of the UN and the sooner it is settled according to the wishes and aspirations of the Kashmiris the better it would be for the entire world,” Ghizali stressed.
The NSF activists however asserted that the majority of Kashmiris did not subscribe to the option of accession and wanted to see their region as an independent and sovereign state.
“We don’t want to live as slaves of Islamabad and New Delhi but as a free nation... We are struggling for that and soon our state will emerge as a sovereign state on the globe,” one NSF leader said.

Lastupdate on : Wed, 5 Jan 2011 21:30:00 Makkah time
Lastupdate on : Wed, 5 Jan 2011 18:30:00 GMT
Lastupdate on : Thu, 6 Jan 2011 00:00:00 IST