Srinagar, July 13: Eight separatist leaders, including JKDFP president Shabir Ahmad Shah, vice-chairman of JKLF Javid Ahmad Mir and chairperson of Kashmir Mass Movement Farida Bhanji, were taken into preventive custody today by police when they tried to march to the Martyrs Graveyard here with their followers, official sources said. Jammu and Kashmir Democratic Freedom Party (JKDFP) Shah and the others had planned to lead a procession to the graveyard in downtown Srinagar to pay homage to the martyrs of 1931 who had launched a struggle for ushering in democratic rule in the state.
As Shah, Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF) leader Mir and Bhanji brought out small processions from their respective offices in Rajbagh, they were stopped by police who had been deployed in strength in the area because of VIP movement, the sources said. They were informed that they could not proceed as a government function was scheduled at the graveyard, an official spokesman said.
However, the separatists tried to break the police cordon forcing the policemen to use lathis to disperse them, the sources said. Eight of them, including Shah, Mir, Bhanji, Maulvi Bashir, Mohammad Abdullah Tari, Mehrajuddin Bhat, Saleem Geelani and Ali Mohammad Bhat were taken into custody, the spokesman said.
A JKDFP spokesman, however, claimed that police had informed them that government had no objection to their taking out the procession.
The government spokesman said the procession was stopped only because its timing clashing with that of the government function and claried that the government had not imposed any restriction on movement of people and visits to the Martyrs Graveyard. Bureau Report