Indian police have charged the family members of late Hurriyat leader Syed Ali Geelani under the draconian anti-terror law for allegedly chanting ‘anti-India’ slogans and wrapping the deceased’s body in Pakistan’s flag.
Ali Geelani passed away aged 92 on Wednesday last week. He had been under house arrest for years. The late resistance leader’s son, Naseem, was quoted as saying that the Indian authorities forcibly buried the body in a local graveyard without any family members. The body was reportedly ‘snatched’ from the family. However, the Indian police had denied the claims.
It is believed that authorities feared a mass mourning event might turn into unrest. Soldiers and barbed wire blockades were seen on nearly all main roads in Srinagar.
It was Geelani’s wish to be buried at the Martyrs Cemetery in Srinagar, but authorities rejected that request, police sources told newsmen.
“We basically took control of the arrangements,” an official said.
Geelani’s special representative Abdullah Geelani had claimed that the family did not know where the veteran Kashmiri leader had been buried. “The Indian Army has seized Geelani’s body,” he said. “We don’t know where he has been laid to rest,” he had said on the day of the burial last week.
