British lawmakers persist on ending ban on FAT schools in IIOJK

MP Afzal Khan writes to UK Minister for South Asia, highlights pattern of illegal detentions by Indian militiary

LONDON:

India snatching the basic right of education from the youth in Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IIOJK) continues to trigger concerns in important world capitals.

In a letter to UK Minister for South Asia Lord Tariq Ahmad, British Member of Parliament Afzal Khan – who also serves as the UK Minister for North Africa, the UN and the Commonwealth at the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office (FCDO) – urged Ahmad's office to intervene in the ongoing situation.

Khan alerted Lord Ahmad on how the Indian military had closed many schools in Kashmir.

“The closure of hundreds of schools (…) will deprive young Kashmiris from basic education,” he wrote in his letter, adding that some 300 schools run by the Falah-e-Aam Trust (FAT) were shut down, impacting over 60,000 students and staff employed by the trust.

In June, the Indian regime ordered the closure of all FAT schools where thousands of students from modest backgrounds attained quality education. Moreover, 4,000 people were directly or indirectly employed by the FAT schools.

Earlier, British lawmaker Jess Phillips had said education was the fundamental right of every human being and “the war (in IIOJK) that has anything to do with them [students]… it is not their doing.”

“The children of Kashmir must be educated. We will be looking to the UK government to ensure they are intervening so that children of Kashmir are educated,” Phillips had told members of Tehreek-e-Kashmir UK in London.

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The FAT schools in IIOJK were registered with the puppet administration in 1972 and were later opened across the IIOJK of the United Nations-designated disputed territory.

According to Article 4 of the FAT constitution: “It is a non-political body dedicated to education and service to mankind.”

The FAT constitution makes it clear that the opening of educational institutions is mandated to educate students from all shades of society without any discrimination.

Illegal detention of Ahsan Untoo

In his letter, MP Afzal Khan further informed Lord Ahmad of the illegal detention of human rights activist Ahsan Untoo who had been “arbitrarily detained by Indian security forces since January 14”.

“This is a part of a pattern,” Khan said about the activist's arrest, linking it with the abduction and illegal arrest of Kashmiri resistance leader Muhammad Yasin Malik and the unlawful detention of Kashmiri human rights defender Khurram Parvez.

“The significance of the situation not only has severe implications for the people of Jammu and Kashmir, who have lived in a state of perpetual violence for the past 30 years, but also the peace of the wider region,” the British lawmaker told Lord Ahmad.

Afzal maintained that the facilitation of a peace process in Kashmir was in everyone’s interest.

It is important to note that in a separate communication to the former UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who recently resigned, a group of four British lawmakers proposed a UK government-backed human rights and diplomats forum on the UN-designated disputed territory of the IIOJK.

It further urged the British government to press India to grant unhindered access to international human rights groups to IIOJK.

British Parliament member Afzal Khan's letter to UK Minister on South Asia Lord Tariq Ahmad, informing him of the ongoing atrocities in IIOJK by the Indian regime.