Maqbool Butt shaheed had a holy cause with a holy end: Farooq Rehmani

ISLAMABAD, Feb 11 (SABAH): “The people of Jammu and Kashmir today where ever in East or West are observing today 39th martyrdom anniversary of Muhammad Maqbool Butt shaheed, who had a National cause for his people and end his life with it by kissing gallows in Tihard Jail on 11February, 1984” says Muhammad Farooq Rehmani, Chairman Jammu and Kashmir People’s Freedom League and ex-Convener All Parties Hurriyat Conference AJ&K in his rich tributes to life and struggle of the martyred Freedom fighter of Kashmir.

He said that Maqbool Butt first left his home in Kashmir during 1950s, crossed into Pakistan to organise the freedom movement in different ways and came back to the IIOJ&K in 1960s with a fulfleged mission but was arrested and imprisoned and sentenced, but again made his way to enter Azad Jammu and Kashmir. Once again seeing the conditions of his homeland akin to a political revolution, he made his 2nd attempt in 1976 to sneak into the IIOJ&K, but unfortunately, he was again arrested and kept in the high security prison in Tihard Jail, where a good number of Kashmiri resistance leaders are languishing since 1990s or from the beginning of this century.

Muhammad Farooq Rehmani said that however, the Indian government made a revengeful decision to send him to gallows without listening to his defense counsel and the execution was rightly described and condemned by many in the sub continent, especially by a popular newspaper of Jammu Kashmir Times as a judicial murder.

“Today his mortal remains and that of Afzal Guru Shaheed remain buried in the premises of Tihard jail and the people of Kashmir especially the parents and the family members of both these martyred sons have time and again demanded that the international community should use their influence to hand over the last mortal remains to the concerned families in the IIOJ&K. The mortal remains of Maqbool Butt as well as of Afzal Guru were a great irritant and cause of concern and tension in the Occupied region” states Muhammad Farooq Rehmani.

He further said that the political and economic life of the people of Jammu and Kashmir today had been squeezed and crippled by the racist Modi establishment of India and there is everywhere an atmosphere of fear due to arrests, long imprisonments and depriving common people of their properties in the name of drive against so called encroachments or illegal constructions. He said that the hidden aim behind it was to implement India’s colonial settler-policy and strike at the roots of the demographic character of Muslims of Jammu and Kashmir.

He emphasised upon the United Nations to invoke its resolutions on Jammu and Kashmir and equally impressed upon other regional and European organisations especially the Organisation of Islamic Co operation to play their part in resolving the problem of Kashmir to end an environment of fear and political and economic suffocation in the Occupied State of Jammu and Kashmir.

Meanwhile the All Parties Hurriyat Conference Azad Jammu Kashmir and Pakistan Chapter, Convener Mehmood Ahmed Sagar, General Secretary Sheikh Abdul Mateen and Secretary Information Imtiaz Wani in a Joint statement issued to press regarding while paying tributes to the prominent martyred Kashmiri leader, Mohammad Maqbool Butt has said that the martyr was a great freedom leader who lit the candle of freedom movement in occupied Kashmir. He said, the Kashmiri people treading the path of martyr Maqbool Butt was writing a new chapter of history of sacrifices in the occupied territory.

“The hearts of men and women are bright and they are giving sacrifices to continue the mission of their great leader,” he added. He said that since February 11, 1984, when Maqbool Butt was hanged in New Delhi’s Tihar jail, his body is still buried in the jail premises.

He said urged the UN to send a team to take stock of the sufferings of the oppressed people of IIOJK and the plight of the Kashmiri detainees. He said the life of many incarcerated Hurriyat leaders implicated in false cases is in danger and the UN should force India to release all such leaders from illegal detention.