After the arrest of its Chairman Muhammad Yasin Malik by police in an overnight raid the party today said crackdown on political and religious leadership “won’t yield anything but add to anarchy and chaos”.
“Choking political space is undemocratic and caging peaceful political leadership is like suppressing voices,” said a spokesman of JKLF while condemning the arrest of Malik and hundreds of others in nocturnal raids across the valley.
Malik was arrested and shifted to police station Kothi-Bagh on Friday night. Police have also arrested JKLF district president Ganderbal Bashir Ahmad Rather (Boya) along with Fayaz Ahmad and it raided the houses of party zonal president Noor Muhammad Kalwal and senior zonal vice president Muhammad Yasin Butt, said the spokesman. He said mass arrests have been reported from across the valley during which almost all leadership of Jamat-i-Islami including its Ameer Dr Hameed Fayaz have also been arrested.
Terming spree of arrests and raids as “arbitrary and most undemocratic act under the garb of democracy and security”, JKLF said that when space for peaceful politics was “choked” and voices of political dissent “suppressed”, it was only “violence that gets glorified putting every other civilized means in total jeopardy”.
Meanwhile JKLF has expressed grief and sorrow over passing away of mother of Abdul Raof Wani who died on 21 January 1990 during GawKadal massacre. Terming the deceased mother as symbol of sacrifice, JKLF has prayed for her heavenly abode.