A file photo of Muslim League-Q leader Mushahid Hussain Syed during press conference in Quetta. PHOTO: PPI
ISLAMABAD: Senator Mushahid Hussain, the head of the Senate Committee on Defence, called the hanging of an innocent Kashmiri, Afzal Guru by India on Sunday a “judicial murder.”
The Senator denounced the act as a “gross travesty of justice,” as he recalled the judgment passed by Supreme Court of India that said that the death sentence was aimed at satisfying the “collective conscience of the society.”
While talking to media, he said that even prominent figures of India, like author and political activist Arundhati Roy, have decried as inhuman the hanging of Guru without letting him meet his family.
He expressed support for the hunger strike called by Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF) Chairman Muhammad Yasin Malik and said that people of Pakistan share the resentment against the injustice.
Additionally, Mushahid Hussain, who is also the secretary general of Pakistan Muslim League-Q, censured Indian Finance Minister Chidambaram for making claims in his speech to a think tank on February 6 that India shares a 106 kilometer border with Afghanistan.
He rebuked the statement as irredentist because India does not share any physical contact with Afghanistan. He added that such utterances clearly manifest the expansionist motives of the neighouring country’s establishment.
He claimed that such issues may vitiate the atmosphere between the two countries.
Published in The Express Tribune, February 11th, 2013.
COMMENTS (9)
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Let me see if I can make it simple: The whole of the princely state of Kashmir was ceded to India by its erstwhile king when threatened by the Pakistani forces and Pakistani backed terrorists. The fact that Pakistan illegally occupies part of Kashmir does not divert from the fact that legally India "owns" all of Kashmir. Do you deny that their a direct physical border between Afghanistan and Kashmir?
@gp65: I don't think it is a mistake. It signifies the illegal occupation of Kashmir by Pakistan which shares border with Afghanistan.
@Advice: I was surprised that Chidambaram who is a HArvard educated lawyer could make such a stupid mistake as saying that India shares a border with Afghanistan. I google searched and find that the only search results point to Pakistani news websites. There is absolutely no independent source who can confirm that. Please provide reference if you can find one outside the Pakistani echo chamber.
India shares border with Afghanistan !!?? joke of this year :)
"The Senator denounced the act as a “gross travesty of justice,” as he recalled the judgment passed by Supreme Court of India that said that the death sentence was aimed at satisfying the “collective conscience of the society.”"
The senator is quoting one sentence out of context implying that he was killed not because he was guilty but to satisfy society. This is because the Senator has probably not read the judgment and was going by the Kashmiri leader Geelani's sound bytes. It is typical of Geelani to accuse Supreme court of bias after he himself was tried and acquitted in the very same case. Here are some details.
In its 271-page judgement delivered on August 4, 2005, a division bench of Justice P V Reddi and Justice P P Naolekar had said there was clinching evidence against Guru regarding his nexus with the terrorists who carried out the “terrorist act of most diabolical nature”. There was not even a shred of doubt about his complicity in hatching of the criminal conspiracy to attack Parliament and evidence showed that he had actively participated in its execution, it said. “All evidences unerringly point to Afzal Guru, a key conspirator, who played an active role”, the Bench said observing that by no standards his act could be termed innocuous.” While justifying the imposition of capital punishment on Guru, Justice Reddi had said the attack on Parliament was “a gravest crime of enormous severity” and was a classic case falling under the “rarest of rare” category. “The collective conscience of the society will be satisfied only if the death penalty is awarded to Afzal Guru,” the Bench had said.
This man didnt deserve anything less than the death penalty.....One who will attack my bharat,we will definitely kill him.This is a clear message for likes of hafiz saeed and dawood ibrahim....
BTW what is the law in Pakistan for people involved in terrorist activities? Please someone enlighten
Pakistani leaders have never to comment on Afzal Guru's death sentence because this is Indian government's extremely internal matter and in other words commenting on Afzal Guru's death sentence by the Pakistani leadership either in the government or in the opposition shall be considered interference in Indian internal matters.....
India shares a 106 kilometer border with Afghanistan ?????
oh really.. what about America and Antartica.. Are they also shares some km(s) or meters of the border with you ?.. Mr. Finance Minister Chidambaram, I wish you you could learn some Geography only to understand the Google maps atleast :D