SRINAGAR: A senior separatist who participated in huge anti-India rallies in Kashmir has been charged under a tough law, sparking rioting by his supporters, police said yesterday.
Yasin Malik, 42, was arrested in the northern district of Sumbhal last month after he launched an anti-election campaign in the area.
“Today he (Malik) was charged under Public Safety Act and sent to a jail,” a police officer told AFP, requesting not to be named. India last month decided to hold state elections in Kashmir in seven phases, starting Nov. 17.
Malik has been charged with threatening India’s security under a legal act that could see him jailed without trial for two years. He is the sixth senior separatist to have been charged under the act since September.
Police also arrested two other key separatist leaders in Kashmir yesterday under a tough security law that allows detention for up to two years without trial, triggering clashes with hundreds of Muslim protesters, officials said.
Police and paramilitary soldiers fired tear gas and swung batons to disperse the angry protesters, who hurled rocks at them, said Prabhakar Tripathi, a spokesman for the paramilitary Central Reserve Police Force. There were no immediate reports of injuries.
Besides Malik, the separatist leaders, Ghulam Nabi Sumji and Maulvi Showkat — were arrested for opposing elections scheduled to start later this month to choose a new government in the Indian-administered region, a police officer said on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to reporters.
The separatists oppose Indian rule in the Muslim-majority region. Separatists and Muslim rebels oppose Indian-held elections arguing they strengthen New Delhi’s hold over the disputed scenic region. In the past few months, Kashmir has witnessed the biggest pro-independence demonstrations since an insurgency erupted in 1989.
The protests have been met by a tough crackdown by Indian security forces. The recent protests were triggered by a row over a government donation of Kashmiri land to a Hindu pilgrimage trust and spiraled into anti-India demonstrations that left nearly 50 Muslim protesters dead.
Malik’s supporters poured on to the streets of Srinagar and enforced a shutdown in some areas as activists smashed car and bus windows, and pelted riot police with stones and bricks. Police said nearly a dozen people were hurt, including some policemen.
Police have arrested at least 30 separatist leaders and activists in a crackdown on their campaign against the elections, officials say. In recent months, the Himalayan region has seen some of its largest protests against Indian rule in two decades. At least 48 people have died in the unrest, most of them killed when Indian soldiers opened fire on Muslim demonstrators. On Friday, at least 25 protesters and 29 police and paramilitary soldiers were injured in clashes, police said. Anti-India sentiment runs deep in Kashmir, where most people favor independence from mainly Hindu India or a merger with predominantly Muslim Pakistan.
