In occupied Kashmir, the All Parties Hurriyat Conference Chairman, Syed Ali Gilani, has strongly condemned the summoning of his second son, Dr Naeem Gilani by India’s National Investigating Agency saying that New Delhi is harassing and intimidating his family members just to pressurize him.
Syed Ali Gilani in a statement issued in Srinagar said, “We have explained our point of view in closed doors as well as in the public. I have been caged in my four-walled residence for the past nine years, not to talk of any political activity. I have not been allowed to attend any social function also, after putting a siege around me they have targeted my family particularly two sons.”
He said, “Earlier my younger son Dr Naseem Gilani was summoned by both NIA and Enforcement Directorate and now my elder son Dr Naeem has been called by NIA to Delhi.”
He said Naeem is a heart patient under regular supervision of doctors and psychological stress can prove fatal for him. “If questioning anybody, including my son is must they can do so in the Valley,” Gilani added.
He said, “New Delhi is harassing and intimidating my family just to pressurize me, but these cowardly acts will yield nothing. In 2017 also, when ghost of NIA threatened every freedom-loving person, particularly their families including common and businessman, we voluntarily offered ourselves to be questioned by the investigating agency, but authorities didn’t dare to face us.”
Gilani pointed out that if New Delhi treated them as law breakers and wanted to clarify their doubt, “I once again offer myself for such questioning and my past more than 50 years political career stands testimony to the fact that all the agencies, overt or covert, are well aware of my political stand.”
“I have been facing atrocities, curbs, jails, interrogation by the rulers for the past seven decades. They can’t break my resolve by intimidating my family.” He said, “I have consciously and willfully adopted this torturous and thorny path of perusing the movement for the basic and fundamental rights of my nation, and no power on earth can deter me from this holly mission.”