On January 30, even while VVIP’s were driving to Rajghat in Delhi to pay homage to Mahatma Gandhi and security personnel were stopping all movement of people to protect the VVIP’s from "terrorist threat", an important action unfolded opposite the Rajghat. Banners calling for defence of human rights of Kashmiri people and condemning state terrorism were put up by activists belonging to a number of organizations who had decided to organise the protest jointly. Activists of Lok Raj Sangathan, Asha Parivar, NAPM, INSAF, PEACE, Association for India’s Development, Nature Human Centric Peoples Movement, Lok Kala Manch, Sailab Kala Kendra, and others, from Delhi, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan and Kashmir participated vigorously in the dharna and presented their views on the state terrorism against kashmiri people both within Kashmir and in rest of India, as well as the solution to the Kashmir problem.
Among those who addressed the dharna were Faisal Khan, Sandeep Pande, Prof Ali Javed, Gurmukhji, Koshal Kumar, Sheetal, Prof VK Tripathi, Ramphal Dahiya, Rona, Bharat Gandhi and Chhaya.
Addressing the gathering, Prakash Rao, Convenor of Lok Raj Sangathan, pointed out that terrorism, including communal genocide, was a preferred weapon of reactionary states the world over, including the Indian state. Like Tsarist Russia, France, Britain, Germany and the US, the Indian state has deployed terrorism, including communal massacres to maintain its rule over the people. British rulers deployed state terrorism including communal massacres to maintain their hated rule, and the Indian state has further perfected this weapon. People are not terrorists, and we must expose the propaganda of the ruling circles on this score. A state that does not provide Sukh and Raksha to its people has no right to exist and all of us must fight together to get rid of the present state, a colonial legacy meant for colonial and imperial plunder of the people, and establish a state where security and prosperity is ensured for all, where human rights are guaranteed for all. India, he pointed out, is a multi national country with hundreds of nations and peoples within its geographical borders. We can live together in harmony with one another, and for this, the national rights of each people must be recognized and guaranteed. The solution to the problems facing Kashmir and India rests in the hands of the people of India, and we must awaken and enlighten the people on the reality of the present Indian state and its hand behind terrorism. While concluding, Prakash Rao pointed out that it will be dangerous for us to have illusions that the US wants peace between India and Pakistan and a solution to the Kashmir problem. The US wants India and Pakistan to be at loggerheads with each other, it wants the Kashmir problem to continue to fester, as it allows it space to increase its domination over South Asia.
Earlier, Prof SR Geelani of Delhi University, who had been given death penalty for the terrorist strike on Parliament on Dec 13, 2001, explained at length the terrible situation faced by Kashmiris in the valley at the hands of the Security Forces as well as the killer gangs set up by the state. He also spoke about the persecution of Kashmiris in Delhi, Pune, Mumbai and everywhere else in the country. Professors and students of Kashmiri origin were routinely picked up and tortured by the special cell of the Delhi police, and many a time, the police declared in court a year or two later that there was no case against these people and they were released from jail and the torture chambers. But no one questioned what happened to the shattered lives of these students and teachers and their families.
he dharna ended with the decision to send a fact finding team consisting of delegates from the different participating organisations to the Kashmir valley in the first week of May 2006 to interact with the people of Kashmir . It was also decided to organise more such programs all over the country to highlight the plight of the Kashmiri people to all of the people of India .
