PSA slapped on Maqbool’s brother

Tribune News Service

Srinagar, April 30

After the detention of hardline separatist leader Masarat Alam, the J&K Government has now booked Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF) leader Zahoor Ahmad Bhat under the Public Safety Act. Zahoor is the younger brother of slain JKLF founder Maqbool Bhat.

Zahoor , who is in jail since 2013, has been lodged at the Baramulla sub-jail after detention orders were passed against him.

“The detention orders under the PSA were issued by the District Magistrate, Kupwara, on April 28 and executed by the police on April 29,” an official said.

Maqbool Bhat, widely regarded as the pioneer of armed resistance in Kashmir, was executed in Tihar jail in 1984 in a murder case and is buried there.

In April 2014, the J&K Police had booked Zahoor for murder and criminal conspiracy in the June 2013 Hyderpora attack on an Army convoy. He is facing trail in the case. Earlier on March 29, 2014, he was booked and detained under the PSA in the same case on the orders of the District Magistrate, Budgam.

Meanwhile, separatists, including the moderate Hurriyat, have condemned Zahoor’s detention under the PSA.

“The present dispensation has unleashed terror on innocent people,” JKLF leader Javaid Mir said in a statement while condemning the detention of Zahoor under the PSA.

“The family of Maqbool Bhat has made tremendous sacrifices. The attitude of the state administration towards his brother Zahoor and other family members is totally undemocratic and against the principles of justice,” the moderate Hurriyat headed by Mirwaiz said in a statement today.