Srinagar: Kashmir High Court Bar Association on Monday endorsed strike call given by Joint Resistance Leadership (JRL) for tomorrow and demanded that JKLF chief Mohammad Yasin Malik be brought back and got treated in any hospital of the State so that his life is saved and is not put in any kind of danger. The lawyers’ body also demands that his wife and daughter, who have not been allowed to meet Mohammad Yasin Malik, for the last so many years, be granted visa so that they take care of the ailing leader, both in the hospital and at home.
The lawyers’ body expressed serious concern over the deteriorating health condition of Mohammad Yasin Malik who is on a hunger strike for the last 12 days and is lodged in a hospital in handcuffs, where he is not even taking lifesaving drugs, which are essential for his very survival.
“Since Mohammad Yasin Malik is suffering from a chronic heart ailment and his incarceration is bound to affect his health, he had been detained under Public Safety Act and lodged in Central Jail, Kotebalwal Jammu, wherefrom, he was abruptly taken to New Delhi and produced before an NIA Court, which remanded him to police custody, which by itself shows that the concerned authorities have no respect for rule of law and they trample their own law under their own feet and treat anyone in any manner they like, irrespective of the consequences, it may ensue, which is highly reprehensible.”
The lawyers’ body once again reiterates its stand that holding of elections in the State of J&K is no solution to the Kashmir issue or a substitute to the right of self-determination guaranteed to the people of Kashmir by the UN Security Council as also by the Indian Leaders, both inside and outside the Indian Parliament.
The Bar Association maintains that from October 1947, the people of Kashmir have been offered and promised a plebiscite, in the first instance by India represented by Prime Minister Pt. Jawahar Lal Nehru and Lord Mountbatten, the then Governor General of India and thereafter, by a stream of resolutions passed by the United Nations. Pt. Nehru repeated his promise in his letters to Pakistan Prime Minister, broadcast it to the Indian people and made an impassioned speech in Srinagar, soon after the military had “bedded in and around Kashmir.”
In his letter to British Prime Minister Clement Attlee, Pt. Nehru said: “I should make it clear that question of aiding Kashmir in this emergency is not designed to influence the State…. to accede to India… the question of accession must be decided in accordance with the wishes of people and we adhere to this view….”
“The Bar Association feels that plebiscite is a sacred value in the emancipated world society and is respected and regarded so and has been implemented in several parts of the world by United Nations itself and in determining the question of sovereignty of any country the interest of population concerned have been given equal weight because it is the people who determine the destiny of the territory and not the territory which determines the destiny of the people,” the Bar Association said in a statement, continuing, “ It is, therefore, better for Indian Leadership to understand the ground reality of Kashmir and not to resort to the off repeated futile exercise of holding elections, one after the other, in the State of J&K apparently to strengthen the Indian hold on Kashmir, as it has yielded in no results in the past and will yield none, in future as well.”
The members also expressed grief and sorrow over the demise of a Senior Advocate, Shah Mohammad, who breathed his last on Saturday, the 20th of April, 2019 at his Kantha Bagh, Baramulla, residence, who was ailing for the last few months. The members while condoling the sad demise, prayed to Almighty Allah to rest his soul in peace and give courage to his family members to bear the irreparable loss.
