Peoples’ Democratic Party (PDP) chief and former J&K Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti on Friday claimed she has been illegally detained inside her own house and the local administration was not allowing her to step out to visit family of a PDP leader Waheed Ur Rehman Para, arrested by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) in New Delhi.
Before any official confirmation, Mehbooba posted a tweet claiming, “I have been illegally detained yet again. Since two days, the J&K admin has refused to allow me to visit the ParaWahid family in Pulwama. BJP Ministers & their puppets are allowed to move around in every corner of Kashmir but security is a problem only in my case.”
The J&K Police, however, denied these allegations. The twitter handle of the Kashmir Zone Police in a tweet clarified, “PDP leader Mehbooba Mufti is not under house arrest. She was requested to postpone her visit to Pulwama purely due to security reasons.
Referring to the arrest of a PDP leader by the NIA two days ago in New Delhi, Mehbooba also tweeted, “Their cruelty knows no bounds.
Waheed was arrested on baseless charges & I am not allowed to even console his family. Even my daughter Iltija has been placed under house arrest because she also wanted to visit Waheed’s family.”
“I am going to hold a Press conference at 3:00 pm today & will brief the press on various issues. Request the media to kindly come” Mehbooba tweeted.
Omar Abdullah also reacted to the development on social media. Referring to the similar treatment meted out to his father Farooq Abdullah, Omar tweeted, “Parking a truck in front of our gates is now standard operating procedure for this admin. They did the same to my father recently to stop him from praying. Personal liberty is treated as a favour by the government, to give & withdraw at will, with no interference from the judiciary.”
Later in the day when the media too was denied permission to attend a press briefing organised by the PDP Chief, Mehbooba posted another tweet claiming, “Press has been barred from entering my residence in Srinagar. This despite no written orders explaining my arbitrary detention. Kashmir is an open air prison where no one has the right to express their opinion”.
“We are one day away from DDC polling & it’s evident that the admin here is using fear & intimidation in tandem to muffle any form of opposition,” Mehbooba stated in another tweet.
