Several mainstream politicians holding their party flags are roaming freely and organising meetings in different parts of Jammu & Kashmir.
Ironically, on Thursday leaders belonging to the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) were prevented by the policemen from stepping out of their houses to reach party headquarters to attend a maiden meeting after the abrogation of Article 370 and 35-A.
PDP leaders claimed, “when we were ready to step out of our houses we were prevented by the policemen stationed there from stepping out”. “None of the leaders, including former Cabinet ministers were handed over any official order or were verbally informed by any senior officer why they were being prevented from stepping out of their homes to attend a meeting convened at the party headquarters by PDP general secretary Ghulam Nabi Lone Hanjura”, a junior PDP leader told local reporters at the party office in Srinagar.
To expose the local authorities, several PDP leaders posted images/ videos showing how policemen disallowed them from stepping out on different social media platforms. “Despite being free on paper and in government submissions in the High Court and Supreme Court, PDP leadership continues to be under illegal detention, without any official orders. Video from today - I wasn't allowed to attend the PDP meeting nor were any of my colleagues”, tweeted former minister Naeem Akhtar along with a video clip.
Sajad Khursheed Alam, son of another PDP leader tweeted, “My father Muhammad Khurshid Alam wasn’t allowed to attend the scheduled meeting convened by General Secretary @jkpdp. In all the submissions to HC and SC including the Indian Parliament GOI blatantly lies about the illegal detention of @jkpdp leaders”.
In the last one week BJP's National General Secretary Ram Madhav attended a meeting along with state general secretaries and interacted with the senior leaders, district Presidents and other office bearers at Srinagar in Kashmir.
Jammu and Kashmir National Conference also convened a meeting of the Political affairs committee of the party and deliberated on the current political scenario in Jammu and Kashmir.
The meeting was attended by Dr Farooq Abdullah, Omar Abdullah, senior party leaders including sitting MP's. Jammu based leaders attended the meeting via video conferencing and held threadbare discussions.
The Jammu and Kashmir unit of the Congress party and JKAPNI party leaders too conducted different party programs and were not prevented from holding these party functions.
While organising these meetings all the necessary protocols to prevent spread of Covid-19 were being adhered to very strictly.