Geelani against Amarnath Yatra: Kashmiriyat my foot, its Islamization of the Valley!
Kashmir and the “movement” there, I have held, has nothing to do with Kashmiryat or any Human Rights. It is Islamization of a part of India. Period.
With Islamization comes throwing out of any other faith, belief system and religious minorities. As long as Muslims are in minority, they cannot tire reiterating about the minority rights. But as soon as they come in majority, even the pretense of concern for minorities goes right out of the window. Thousands of temples in Bangladesh and Pakistan have been completely destroyed, and many occupied for some activity or the other.
Syed Geelani – the guy courted by the likes of Arundhati Roy as the champion of Kashmiriyat has been targetting the Amarnath Yatra. (Also read: Hypocrisy of the Kashmir Situation) Now he has stepped up his shrillness. [Check out the Photo feature on Amarnath Yatra)
Syed Ali Shah Geelani, known separatist leader and the head of the hardline faction of Hurriyat Conference, on Wednesday, in a meeting attended by many independent Muslim groups and a few splinter ones, termed the Amarnath Yatra as a “cultural invasion” and blamed the government of India for using the holy pilgrimage as a means to extend its cultural invasion and impose its ideology on Kashmiris.
So, Hindus going to their shrine is a cultural invasion? Maybe some of the Hindus should capture the land around some prominent mosques and start a similar campaign against the Muslims! Right?
It is bad enough that one has to deal with such religious crackpots. What is worse is that professional activists prop up such vile characters as champions of harmony of some screwed up societal ideal! What does he want for the pilgrims going to Amarnath?
Geelani had earlier said that he would launch an agitation after Eid in case authorities fail to stop the construction of a concrete road leading to the Amarnath cave in the Himalayas in south Kashmir, disband Amarnath shrine board and limit the number of pilgrims besides curtailing the time period of the pilgrimage to 15 days instead of two months.
88 people died this time due to weather conditions and travel situations. A concrete road may not solve all the issues, but it can save many lives. Besides, given the length of time it takes and number of people who desire to go there, there is no way that the whole thing can finish in 15 days. So Geelani’s conditions are nothing but an eye-wash. Simply one more step towards complete elimination of any Hindu activity in that state.
One should remember that after all it were Sufis in the Kashmir valley who were responsible for converting people to Islam and of Islamization of the valley. Their negative role, where they targeted the kings so that they could kill the Hindus, take over their shrines etc is well documented.
If one looks at the treatment of Chinese and then see the conditions by Geelani, one finds that Kashmir seems to be more foreign and harsh than China for the Hindu pilgrims!