Amritsar: Joining ranks with the Kashmiris in support of their struggle for freedom the revolutionary political group Dal Khalsa today paid homage to the memory of Mohammad Maqbool Bhatt, who 33 years back was hanged within the Tihar prison Delhi.
Reminiscing his role, Dal Khalsa chief Harpal Singh Cheema while interacting with the media said, “Contemporary activism regarding Kashmiris being a separate people, Kashmiris seeking the right to self-determination is due to the dynamic role of Maqbool Bhatt and his family in bringing Kashmiri independence to the fore.
Dal Khalsa leaders with the family of Maqbool Bhatt.
Furthermore Dal Khalsa spokesperson Kanwarpal Singh said that he had the privilege to visit his ancestral house of Maqbool Bhatt and interact with his family. In a media statement, he shared that the house where he lived including all his belongings has been preserved for posterity. He further said, “How many mothers like Bibi Shahmala -the mother of Maqbool Bhatt, on this planet can be at peace with themselves after sacrificing four sons at the altar of a cause, that too a common cause of peoples’ freedom.”
He hoped that the Kashmiri people will soon realise the fruits of the sacrifice of Maqbool Bhatt and gain freedom from Indian yoke.
The party president further said that the defaulting Indian state and their stooge government in Kashmir do not realise that conflict resolution and not suppression is the cure. “They hanged one Maqbool Bhat in 1984. Today there are so many in the valleys of Kashmir that the entire might of the Indian state has failed to contain them. You can kill a person, not an idea and certainly not a commitment.”
Reminding the Indian state and its judiciary of failing to be civil and humane, party spokesperson Kanwarpal Singh said, “It is shameful that the Indian state for not returning the mortal remains of Maqbool Bhatt.”
The echoing cries of freedom in Kashmir, the on-going struggle led by Janab Syed Ali Shah Geelani are an endorsement of the dreams of Maqbool Bhatt and the people of Kashmir. “We stand in complete solidarity with the people of Kashmir and take this occasion to reiterate our respect for martyrs including Maqbool Bhatt.