Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah on Thursday said AAP Rajya Sabha member Sanjay Singh had been detained illegally in Srinagar.
Singh, along with other AAP leaders, had arrived in Srinagar on Wednesday after the arrest of the party’s Doda MLA Mehraj Malik under the stringent Public Safety Act (PSA). On Thursday, the police stopped Singh and other members from leaving the Circuit House to hold a protest.
“Use of the PSA against MLA (Doda) is wrong. And now you have aggravated the mistake by illegally detaining a Rajya Sabha member. Have you served any order of detention on him? "This is not good for democracy in Jammu and Kashmir and the message it sends out also is not good. Those who are doing it should reconsider their actions,” Omar told mediapersons.
He said if there were objections to Malik’s behaviour, the matter could have been taken up with the Assembly Secretariat or the Speaker. “But the use of PSA is wrong,” he added.
Omar said he met Malik’s father and assured him of all possible help.
“My advice to the AAP leaders is to engage a lawyer who understands the PSA and has dealt with such cases. This law is not in force anywhere in the country except Jammu and Kashmir. If they bring a lawyer from outside, it will take him time to understand the law. I have spoken to some lawyers ... I myself had to fight against the PSA in 2020. I engaged a lawyer here who contested the case in the Supreme Court,” he added.
Abdullah also criticised the media for presenting detention of political leaders as “claims” instead of facts. “You are asking questions as if Sanjay Singh is lying. It is not his claim but the truth. Repeatedly the channels and newspapers say that we (politicians) claim.... This is not a claim. This is the truth,” he said.
Omar recalled the events of July 13 and July 14 and asserted that those were not claims but the reality.
"On July 13, we did not claim that we had been detained, we were detained. On July 14, we did not claim manhandling, we were manhandled. And today also is a reality that Sanjay Singh has been detained. What are the reasons? Only those behind the decision can say it," he said.
Omar said while the LG administration, which controls the law and order machinery in Jammu and Kashmir, claims that everything was fine in Jammu and Kashmir.
"They claim that the atmosphere is good and people are happy but the reality is that they do nothing but highhandedness. They did it with us, they used the wrong law to arrest Mehraj Malik because there is no reason for the arrest," he said.
Also Read: PSA against Malik unjustified, says Dr Farooq
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