Hurriyat steps in JNU's Afzal Guru controversy, supports student protest

As the Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) administration ordered a "disciplinary" enquiry into holding of an event on campus against the hanging of Parliament attack convict Mohammad Afzal Guru, the Hurriyat Conference has opposed the step of the JNU administration saying the students have neither committed any act of violence in the university campus nor indulged in any illegal activity.  "During their peaceful protest, they have raised slogans against hanging of Mohammad Afzal Guru and in support of Kashmir's freedom. Why should India, which claims herself as largest democracy in the world, gets perturbed with such a small event," Hurriyat Conference faction led by Syed Ali Geelani said.

The Hurriyat spokesman Ayaz Akbar accused "Indian media" of creating mob hysteria over the event and described it as a move to make Kashmiri students studying in the JNU and elsewhere vulnerable.

The Hurriyat reaction has come on a day when the valley remained shut on the call of separatists to observe anniversary of pro-independence Jammu Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF) founder Mohammad Maqbool Bhat. Bhat was hanged in Tihar jail in 1984 on charges of being involved in conspiracy of killing of a CID inspector. On February 9 also Kashmir observed shutdown on the call of separatists to observe anniversary of Mohammad Afzal Guru's hanging. Separatists are demanding mortal remains of Bhat and Guru.

Jammu and Kashmir government took dozens of separatists into preventive custody ahead of the Guru's anniversary and clamped curfew like restriction on February 9 and 11 to preempt protests.

The Hurriyat Conference, however, termed protests in the JNU against Guru's hanging as exercising of birthright by the students. The Hurriyat said if the university authorities took any action against Kashmiri students it would have strong reaction in Jammu and Kashmir.

Akbar said it was not the first time that Kashmiri students had organized such an event in any educational institution of India. "Wherever they are studying they raise peaceful voices against oppression which Kashmir is facing for a long time. It is also a constitutional, legal and democratic right of the students to show their concerns about Kashmir."