SRINAGAR, SEPT 03 (DNA) – Mayor of Srinagar and Jammu and Kashmir People’s Conference spokesperson Junaid Azim Mattu has strongly criticised Modi-led Hindu nationalist Indian government for the abrogation of Article 370 and the clampdown imposed on Jammu and Kashmir since August 4.

He said, “The main leadership is under detention and their family members are being harassed.” He further added that the detention centers have become more like sub-jails with a jail manual.

The mayor termed the ‘assumption’ that life in Kashmir was normal, as presented by media and the Indian government, as “highly unrealistic”.

He added: “Containing a sentiment in the aftermath of a radical decision by enforcing a clampdown doesn’t mean that the situation is normal. The BJP government’s policy of detainment seems to be a purely operational one.

Mattu also lashed out at political leaders for sharing pictures of the traffic in Kashmir to show normalcy. He said: “People going out to purchase groceries and medicines cannot be considered as traffic […] the absence of dead bodies doesn’t mean everything is normal and people are happy.”

“We have always lived with a very palpable threat of violence, that’s not a new scenario. But to use it to justify the withdrawal of fundamental rights… that’s at the very core of alienation in Kashmir.”

He said that the abrogation of Article 370 and separating the region into two Union Territories without any discussions with their local representatives “was a humiliation for the state causing existential crisis.”

The mayor also condemned arrests and detentions of mainstream activists. He said: “Over the years, political activists in Kashmir have braved threats and violence by terrorist elements to survive in the mainstream. But today, they are hunted and hounded.” = DNA

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