Srinagar, February 13 (KNO) : Kashmir region observed a complete shutdown to protest the hearing of petitions challenging the constitutional validity of Article 35A of the Constitution in the Supreme Court on Wednesday, witnesses told KNO. Article 35A gives the Jammu and Kashmir legislature the power to define “permanent residents” of the state and provide them with special rights and privileges.
The Joint Resistance Leadership, including Syed Ali Shah Geelani, Mirwaiz Umar Farooq and Yasin Malik, called for the two-day shutdown. All shops, business establishments and educational institutions remained closed while vehicles stayed off the roads in Kashmir Valley.
In Srinagar’s Nowhatta, Safa Kadal, Rainawari, Khanyar and Maharaj Gunj police station areas, authorities imposed section 144 to prevent protests. The state government has also deployed large contingents of police and paramilitary forces across the Valley. Train services on the Baramulla-Banihal track were suspended as a “precautionary measure”.
Geelani continued to be under house detention while Farooq was detained at his house in Nigeen. Jammu Kashmir Liberation Front chairperson Yasin Malik went into hiding to avoid arrest.
Hurriyat Conference (M) chairman Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, who is also the key member of JRL, said the people of Jammu and Kashmir will forcefully “resist every challenge by New Delhi” to change the demography of the state by scrapping article 35-A “through its agents.”
Taking to Twitter, Mirwaiz said the Kashmir Bar Association top lawyers are ready to defend the article 35-A “scheduled for hearing today or tomorrow.” “Article 35A hearing scheduled for today and tomorrow in the Supreme Court of India, Kashmir Bar Association top lawyers ready to defend our case, people of Jammu& Kashmir will forcefully resist every challenge by New Delhi to change the demography of the State by rolling back the hereditary state subject laws of 1927 being contested by its agents,” Mirwaiz tweeted.(KNO)