HARASSING KASHMIRIS A HOBBY OF DYSP GOSWAMI

SRINAGAR; Expressing concern over an assault on Kashmiri detainees in Tihar Jail, chairman Hurriyat Conference (G) Syed Ali Geelani has appealed International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) that it should take immediate notice of this incident and raise the issue with jail authorities.

According to a statement issued from Delhi, Geelani has blamed that this assault has been carried out on the direction of Deputy Superintendent of jail Mr Goswami and ‘he always harass the Kashnmiri prisoners inside the jail in every possible way’.

The Hurriyat Conference (G) chairman said that Kashmiri inmates in Tihar Jail are living a miserable and depressed life and they feel threat to their life. “Jail authorities sometimes directly subject the Kashmiri prisoners to custodial violence and sometimes some professional criminals are hired to attack them. Kashmiri prisoners have been many times attacked in jails in the past, but this time the assault was so strong that Tauseef Ahmad Peer, Ahitsham-ul-Haq and Enginear Fafi Mehmood Bihar got fractures in their bones.”

He said that the detainees who were attacked in Tihar Jail have told their families that the professional criminals in Tihar Jail actually get the directions from the Deputy Superintendent of jail Mr Gouswami to harass the Kashnmiri prisoners. “He is a communal and prejudice minded person and harassing the Kashmiri inmates, is his favourite hobby.”

He said that the custodial violence is against the international laws and it is the worst kind of human rights violation which doesn’t have any legal or moral justification. Geelani has said that the anti Kashmiri wave is spreading all over India and Kashmiris are everywhere treated in a curl and violent ways.
“8 to 10 incidents of this kind have occurred in just a span of one month when Kashmiri were attacked and injured and the fresh attack in Tihar Jail looks to be the branch of this wave. Due to these types of incidents, Kashmiris everywhere in India, are feeling unsafe and uncomfortable and the attack in Tihar Jail have not only raised a question mark on the safety and a security of Kashmiri prisoners in Indian jails, but these incidents are worrisome for their families and they are now very much concerned towards the safety and wellbeing of their dear ones.”
Geelani appealed the officials of ICRC working in India to take serious notice of this inhuman act and raise this issue with the jail authorities and help us in safeguarding the lives of Kashmiri prisoners in Indian Jails. Geelani cautioned the jail authorities and the Indian government that they would be wholly responsible for any untoward act against any Kashmiri prisoner. 

SRINAGAR; The family of a Kashmiri youth detained inside New Delhi’s Tihar Jail since 2005 Monday claimed that he has been attacked by inmates which has left him seriously injured.

The family of Rafiq Ahmad Shah told KNS news agency that he has been attacked inside Tihar jail along with other inmates with the jail authorities turning a blind eye to their state.

“The family of Shah further that the likewise attacks have been carried on the detained Kashmiri youth in the past as well and that the government acts as a mute spectator over the issue,” KNS reported.

Meanwhile, Hurriyat Conference (G) Chairman Syed Ali Geelani condemned the attack on Kashmiri detainees in Tihar jail and said that such acts shall not be tolerated at any cost.

“Criminals inside Tihar jail have been given a freehand to unleash terror on Kashmiri youth and International Red Cross and international human rights organizations must look into the matter,” Geelani said over phone from Delhi.

POONCH: A Pakistani prisoner called Ishtiaq Ahmed lodged in a district jail in Poonch, was rushed to the hospital after he swallowed a blade. At Jammu hospital, a team of doctors removed the blade from his throat. His condition is stable now.

According to police spokesperson, Ahmed, a resident of Pakistani administered Kashmir, was arrested three months ago for crossing the Line of Control.

The jail superintendent has ordered a departmental enquiry into the incident.

Recently, Pakistani prisoner Showkat Ali, 42, a resident of Pind Sail Jathan in Sialkot, Pakistan, was found hanging from the iron window of a toilet inside the prison in the Central Jail in Jammu.

JAMMU; Nearly 2,400 people, including 139 foreign nationals, are in various jails of Jammu and Kashmir, the state Assembly was informed on Tuesday.

“As on January 30, 2,396 prisoners are lodged in different jails in Jammu and Kashmir,” Chief Minister Omar Abdullah, who also holds the Home portfolio, said in a written reply.

As per the breakup, 139 are foreign nationals, 339 convicts, 1875 undertrials, 35 detenues under Public Safety Act (PSA) and six condemned prisoners.

ISLAMABAD (Ang); Farooq Ahmad Khan, an engineer from Islamabad (Anantnag) district of Kashmir, who is in prison for nearly 18 years, is suffering from multiple ailments at the Jaipur Central Jail and “it seems he will die in jail if the trial goes on at the present pace,” his family said Thursday.

Khan, a mechanical engineer by training, was arrested on May 23, 1996 by the infamous Special Task Force of police. He was instantly shifted to Delhi’s Tihar Jail and was charged with triggering bomb blasts in Lajpat Nagar (New Delhi) and in Jaipur, a charge contested by his family.

“Farooq was not associated with the militancy,” his brother Ashiq Hussain told. “He was implicated in the bombings because our family has a long association with the freedom movement,” he said.

A resident of Islamabad’s Janglat Mandi, Khan had a degree in engineering from Madras University and higher studies from London. He had joined the Public Health Engineering department in 1991 and served as a junior engineer for five years before he was arrested.

Since his arrest, Khan has been lodged in different jails within and outside the state and was “subjected to inhuman treatment.”

Ashiq showed a letter written by his brother in jail about six years ago. Khan writes, “I am a human living in the ‘so-called’ world’s biggest democratic country. I am an engineering graduate and I was serving the Kashmir government. I joined its services in 1991 as a junior engineer. Now if you are thinking that at this point of time I will be promoted and will be living a healthy life with my loved ones, you are wrong…

“I am living the life of an unknown prisoner in jails for past 12 years. We all know that life imprisonment means a maximum of 14 years, which I've almost completed. But you will be shocked that I have not crossed my under trial period yet.

“Hail democracy! But this is not one, two or three, we are in hundreds. I have been accused of nothing…My Allah is witness. At the same time I got a chance to keenly monitor the sufferings of Kashmiris lodged in different Indian jails. This injustice has made me understand that India neither has understood us (Kashmiris) nor will understand us…”

A Delhi court acquitted him of the charges after 14 year trial. However, he is currently undergoing trial in the Jaipur bomb blast case.

“Farooq is suffering from multiple ailments at the Jaipur Central Jail, where he has been detained from the last four years. His blood pressure goes out of control. He is suffering from piles as well. He has also developed throat infection. He is not getting adequate treatment at the jail,” Ashiq said.

“No specialist doctor has been arranged by the officials for check up of my brother,” he said, adding that another prisoner Abdul Gani Goni was hospitalized after his condition worsened in the jail leading to protests by Kashmiri inmates.

Expressing displeasure over the pace of the case, Ashiq said that in last nine months, the case has not moved even by an inch, as the two out of five witnesses have not turned up before the court.
“The process is very slow,” Ashiq said. “It seems my brother will die in jail if the trial goes on with the present pace.”

He said he had filed an appeal before the Rajasthan Court requesting that the trial be held on day-to-day basis. However, the court directions, he said, have failed to provide any relief to the family.
“We had also moved a bail application. However, the prosecution objected to it, saying that the witnesses need to be examined first. The case is going nowhere,” he said.

Khan’s prolonged detention, his brother said, has also taken a toll on health of their aged mother. He said that his mother had collapsed during her last meeting with Khan in jail in November last year. (Agencies)

“To keep political prisoners and leaders behind bars despite court orders of their release is an open evidence that J&K has become a Police State,” Muslim League General Secretary, Abdul Ahad Parra in a statement issued to Global News Service (GNS) on Friday said.

“How can one expect the security of human rights in a state where even courts are not honored,” Parra said, adding that League severely condemns the continuous detention of Masrat Alam Bhat, Mushtaq-ul-Islam, Molvi Sajad Ahmad Nagoo, Mir Hafizullah and Shakeel Ahmad Bhat.

He said if government is having a human heart they should release the Hurriyat activists before Eid-ul-Zuha. “The families of these prisoners have pinned hope that they will meet their loved ones on this blessed festival,” League General Secretary said, adding government should release them forthwith before Eid.

Muslim League has also appealed international human rights organizations to press for the release of all the political prisoners immediately. (GNS)

SRINAGAR; 27, Sep 2013: A family in Kashmir’s Old City Friday accused the police of not releasing their lone son despite a city court granting him a bail on Thursday.

Mushtaq Ahmad Sheikh, who hails from Old City’s Nowhatta, was granted a bail by Sadder court in Srinagar, but police didn’t release him, his family told.

However, police deny the charge. Mushtaq was arrested on September 19 on charges of stone-throwing. A mini-bus conductor by profession, he is a lone brother of seven sisters. After his arrest, his mother and sisters took to streets and held a sit-in demonstration to protest his detention. The area remained shut for two days.

“After Sadder court granted Mushtaq bail on Thursday, he was re-arrested by police outside the court and was taken to the office of Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP) where he was kept for some time. We also went there, but initially police barred us from meeting him. Later, my mother and two sisters meet him,” says Mushtaq’s sister, Sakeena Sheikh.

She alleges police is threatening them. “They (police) tell us lodge another First Information Report (FIR) against him,” she says. However, the police categorically deny the family allegations and say they haven’t received any bail order. “We haven’t received any bail order yet,” the in-charge of Nowhatta police station, Showkat Ahmad, told an online news agency.

He, however, admitted that Mushtaq is currently in their custody.