Maqbool Butt’s vision drives Kashmir’s freedom struggle

MUZAFFARABAD: Twenty seven years after disputed Kashmir’s first visionary for a sovereign state, Maqbool Butt, was sent to the gallows, his vision and his legacy still live on.

February 11, 1984, changed the fate of Kashmir when its very own revolutionary, Butt, was hanged in New Delhi’s Tehar Jail, in a murder case pertaining to a shoot out in a bunker in Srinagar in 1966.

Today, he is known as Shaheed-e-Azam, ‘father of the nation’.

Looking back at the armed revolution brought about by the martyr, the month of February carries special significance in the current uprising in occupied Kashmir.

February 11, each year, is marked by Kashmiris on both sides of the Line of Control (LoC) as they observe Butt’s death anniversary. Each year on this day they pledge to renew their resolve to carry on his mission for the liberation of Kashmir from Indian suppression.

Even militant organisations such as Hizbul Mujahideen pay homage to the revolutionary martyr for initiating the armed struggle against the military occupation of Jammu and Kashmir.

As history reveals, Butt fled to Pakistan in 1968 after breaking out of prison, and returned to launch a struggle in 1976 when the hijacking case of an Indian airline was under trial in the country. His death for the cause laid the foundation for the recent uprising in Kashmir.

Butt’s struggle and subsequent hanging by India provoked an inspiration for freedom among the young Kashmiris who began training to take up arms and crossing the Line of Control (LoC) where the atmosphere was charged with the spirit of freedom struggle.

His hanging infused a passion for rebellion among nationalist groups supporting his struggle for an independent Kashmir.

Some of those groups included the Jammu Kashmir National Students Federation (JKNSF), Jammu Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF) and the National Liberation Front (NLF).

Founded in 1962 in Azad Jammu and Kashmir, JKNSF was also among the nationalist organisations in the nineties that promoted Butt’s mission politically and raised the slogan “Azadi ya Kaffan” (freedom or coffin).

On February 11, Kashmiris commit to the memory of their visionary with the utmost pride.

Kashmiris, young and old, will not soon forget the dream that Maqbool Butt had for an independent Kashmir. His name is bound to live on for all the times to come.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 12^th, 2011.