Saadat.in Blog

All roads led to Pampore Saturday. If there was anything visible in this saffron town, it was a sea of people. Kashmir had assembled to pay homage to Sheikh Abdul Aziz, the slain Hurriyat leader who fell to police bullets on a peaceful march to Muzaffarabad.
People including women and children from across the Valley assembled at Eidgah here, climbed rooftops, trees and even sky-touching mobile towers to watch pro-freedom leaders.
On way to Pampore from Srinagar, women offered milk, water and food to the people, who continuously shouted pro-freedom slogans and waved green flags.
“We want freedom,” the people kept shouting.
Since morning people were waiting for the arrival of the leaders. When Mirwaiz Umar Farooq’s cavalcade reached the spot, women showered flower petals on him. Later youth carried Mirwaiz on shoulders in a procession to Eidgah. People also gave rousing welcome to Muhammad Yaseen Malik.
However, people could not control their emotions when Syed Ali Shah Geelani reached there. They huddled, shouted anti-India and pro-freedom slogans and escorted Geelani, who was atop a vehicle, inside the jam-packed Eidgah.
However, not a single cop or troopers was present on the road from Athwajan to Pampore. For hours people kept thronging the town—by foot, on motorcycles and vehicles. The locals had established langars at various places.
But more than food, people preferred to listen to the pro-freedom leaders.
As Geelani started his speech, some youth climbed atop all the mobile towers overlooking the Eidgah, and hoisted green flags. Shouting pro-freedom slogans, people saluted the youth who stood atop the cell towers and kept waving the green flags.
‘Sheikh Aziz Teri Azmat Ko Salam (We salute the grandeur of Sheikh Aziz,” a group of youth carrying the slain leader’s life-size posters shouted.
When the pro-freedom leaders ended their speech, people started to move to their respective destinations in huge processions. On seeing massive procession, two Army trucks abruptly stopped at Athwajan. A group of women taunted the troops for “killing the innocent people of Kashmir.”
Later some youth among the procession paved way for the Army vehicles to leave the spot. At Pantha Chowk the police diverted the procession through the Bypass. However those who managed to move through the highly-fortified zone housing the 15 Corps headquarters, shouted pro-freedom slogans and moved in a procession to Shivpora. Till late evening, youths on motorcycles and vehicles moved through city roads, shouting pro-freedom slogans.

Tags: human rights violations, Kashmir, protests

This entry was posted on Sunday, August 17th, 2008 at 5:15 pm and is filed under Kashmir. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.