Nayeem Khan remembers of veteran Hurriyat leader Ashraf Sehrai
Srinagar: Patron in chief United Democratic Hurriyat Forum (UDHF) Nayeem Ahmed Khan has paid eulogizing tributes to Shaheed Muhammad Ashraf Sehrai on his martyrdom anniversary.
In a message from Tihar jail, the illegally detained UDHF chief while remembering the supreme sacrifices rendered by Sehrai and his family said, “Sehrai-an epitome of resistance- is one of the proud sons of the soil who lived and died for a noble cause”.Sehrai, he said, was a great freedom fighter and a strong proponent of Kashmiris’ right to self determination.
“His (Sehrai’s) life-long contribution to the ongoing freedom struggle is the brightest chapter of resistance history that will continue to inspire future generations”, Khan said adding that the iconic resistance leader would be remembered in the annals of Kashmir history as a great patriot who preferred death rather than compromising his ideals. He urged the Kashmiri nation to come out on 5thMay to pay homage to the iconic leader who after being killed in the custody was secretly buried on the diktats of police to avoid public backlash.
Terming Sehrai’s death in prison as a clear case of custodial killing, Nayeem Khan said that the successive Indian governments have been using illegal detentions as a tool to suppress political dissent in Kashmir.
Referring to arbitrary arrests and preventive detentions of political activists, rights defenders and members of civil society, the HDHF chief said that the BJP government had detained thousands of Kashmiris under lawless laws such as PSA, UAPA and other laws.
The excessive use of preventive detention laws by the Indian government, he said, has led to large scale arrests and house detention of Kashmiri political activists especially after 5thAugust 2019. He said that along with Hurriyat leaders thousands of Kashmiris, mostly youth who have been detained before and after August 2019 continue to suffer in jails outside Kashmir.
He appealed to world human rights bodies to take effective notice of the matter and play their due role in early release of all illegally detained Kashmiri prisoners.
