Srinagar: PDP president Mehbooba Mufti on Sunday said that the Government of India should tread carefully and avoid alienating innocent people while acting against terrorists.
“The Government of India must tread with caution and carefully distinguish between terrorists and civilians following the recent Pahalgam attack,” she said in a post on X, urging Centre “must not alienate innocent people, especially those opposing terror.
“There are reports of thousands being arrested and scores of houses of common kashmiris being demolished along with those of militants,” she said, adding, “Appeal Government to direct the authorities to take care that innocent people are not made to feel the brunt as alienation aids terrorists goals of division and fear.”
In February this year, Mehbooba and Peoples Conference President Sajad Lone had welcomed the J&K and Ladakh High Court’s ruling that an individual cannot be denied a passport just because a family member was involved in militancy.
She had termed the ruling as a “step in the right direction” while strongly criticizing what she described as the weaponization of travel restrictions in Jammu and Kashmir since 2019.
“The honourable High Court’s decision of not denying a passport to an individual for merely being related to a militant is certainly a step in the right direction. Given how even the basic fundamental right to travel is being weaponised brutally since 2019 in J&K,” the PDP President had said in a post on X.
The court had emphasized that the decision to issue a passport must be based on the applicant’s own actions rather than those of their relatives.
The High Court direction came in a plea filed by a resident of Ramban, who had filed an application for passport issuance in 2021. However, his application was kept pending due to an adverse police verification report that Malik’s late brother, Mohammad Ayaz Malik, was a militant of the Hizbul Mujahideen and was killed in an encounter in 2011, while his father was an enlisted over ground worker (OGW). The petitioner in his plea asserted that there were no criminal charges against him and that he was being unfairly penalized for his family’s past.
Pahalgam Attack – Innocent shouldn’t feel the brunt: Mehbooba
