LUCKNOW: The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) has confirmed as many as 19 deaths in police firing on Ottarakhand Activists at Muzaffarnagar on October 2 last year. These do not include the four persons killed in police firing at Khatina in Nainital district.

The CBI counsel, K.N. Chaube, submitting partially concluded report in a sealed cover to the Allahabad High Court, recently, said that the men in Khaki also raped seven women activists. He said that the CBI had accused the Muzaffarnagar police of wrongful confinement of 200 buses each with about 50 Utfarakhandis. Besides, the police has been charged of criminally assaulting a bus carrying 50 women.. The CBI also found that some senior officers in the State Administration tampered with records to conceal their follies. The police fabricated cases against Uttarakhand activists.

The Uttar Pradesh police had on October 2, 1994 opened fire on the Uttarakhandis going from the hill districts to Delhi to participate in a pro Uttarakhand rally. Though a large number of casualties were reported the police termed all such reports as “blown out of proportion.”

Blood is the cost of freedom

NEW DELHI: July 31, 1988 is the date on which the Jammu Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF) says it launched the current armed movement in the Kashmir Valley. On that day the man who actually triggered it, is 32-year old Abdul Ahad Waza. He exploded a bomb outside Srinagar’s Central Telegraph Office (CTO).

The blast shock the entire building carning for Waza the status of a pioneer among militants. He calls himself “one of the founders of the armed struggle.” He is one of the few Kashmiris to have been personally met by the late Pakistan President, Gen Zia-ul-Haq.

Presendly he maintains a neutral posture and is engaged in patching up differences between outfits but feels that the release of Hurriyat leaders from jail has sharpened polarization instead of helping forge a common front.

In the capital for a medical check-up, he recounts his experiences in a brief interview.

Question: You are among the first militants of the valley? You triggered the wave of bomb blasts by exploding one yourself on July 31, 1988. What prompted you to do so?

Ans: Yes, it is true that I am one of the founders of the ongoing freedom struggle. But the armed struggle has been forced on us by the unrealistic approach of New Delhi. We took recourse to arms when we realized that all means of solving the Kashmir dispute by peaceful means had been blocked and New Delhi was in no mood to give us the right of self-determination.

Q: Since the explosion, caused by you, there has been violence and bloodshed. Many young men have been killed. Almost the entire Kashmiri Pandit population has been forced out of the Valley. There is communal hatred which is a negation of Kashmiri ethos. What have you gained by taking recourse to violence?

Ans: No doubt the armed struggle generates violence and causes loss of life, but we believe that freedom never comes on a platter, free of cost. Sacrifice and human blood are the cost of freedom all over the world. Kashmiri Pandits were taken over by a sense of insecurity and they could not assess the situation in right perspective. They left their homes in a huff little knowing that the armed struggle would be a prolonged one. We have not started violence but taken recourse to the armed struggle to draw the world’s attention to the Kashmir problem. We feel satisfied that our scheme has proved a success. Q: When did you first go across the Line of Control? Who all did you meet there?

Ans: I went across the LOC in 1988. We met the entire leadership of the JKLF there.

Article extracted from this publication >> March 10, 1995