India frees last Kashmiri leader after 14 months: ‘We should never forget this humiliation’

Authorities release Mehbooba Mufti, the last political leader under house arrest more than a year after Delhi scrapped Indian-administered Kashmir’s special status

Mufti, 61, was set free late on Tuesday, an official order said (Copyright 2018 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.)

India has finally freed the last of the Kashmiri political leaders it placed under house arrest 14 months ago when the former state of Jammu and Kashmir had its special autonomous status unilaterally revoked.

In her first public statement after she was set free on Tuesday night, Mehbooba Mufti lashed out at the authorities in Delhi and described the actions of the Narendra Modi-led administration as undemocratic and illegal.

A former chief minister of the state that has now been split up into two centrally controlled “union territories”, Ms Mufti shared an audio message on social media calling for “a solution to the Kashmir problem” and the release of all Kashmiri political prisoners.

“Kashmir should never forget the robbery and humiliation," she said. "Everything Delhi has taken away should be taken back.”

Ms Mufti, the leader of the moderate People’s Democratic Party, was detained for more than a year despite never advocating violent separatism for Kashmir. In an interview with The Independent in her home last year, she described a vision for a future in which Kashmir is united as a single economic zone, but where India and Pakistan retain ultimate sovereignty over their existing portions of the region.

Speaking on Wednesday, she referred to 5 August – the date last year when Kashmir’s special status was revoked – as a “black day” in history. 

On 5 August 2019, after bolstering its paramilitary forces in the region and severing access to the internet, the Indian government revoked two key constitutional articles which enshrined Kashmir’s special status. The first, Article 370, entitled the state to its own mini constitution. The second, Article 35a, ensured Kashmiris first rights to property in the region.

The area has been under strict lockdown ever since, with limits on communication and movement. The government had been gradually easing restrictions earlier this year when the Covid-19 pandemic began, shutting down the region once more. 

Kashmir as a whole has been disputed between India and Pakistan since 1947, and India and China from 1962. The portion administered by India suffers from sporadic flare-ups of militant separatism, from those who would either see Kashmir granted freedom as an independent nation or else ceded to Muslim-majority Pakistan. India accuses Pakistan of fomenting such sentiments.

Ms Mufti, who was lodged in two jails before moving to her official residence for the remainder of her arrest, was not the only mainstream Kashmiri leader to be detained under the controversial Public Safety Act, colonial-era legislation that allows the Indian government to detain anyone for up to two years without trial. 

Two other former chief ministers of the erstwhile state, father and son duo Farooq and Omar Abdullah, were also held. Both were released in March this year – at which point India was already entering coronavirus lockdown. Omar joked at the time that he was being freed from one form of house arrest into another. 

On Wednesday the Abdullahs paid a visit to Ms Mufti after her release. Omar tweeted that her detention had been a travesty and was against the basic tenets of democracy.

Ms Mufti’s daughter Iltija Javed, who had been handling her social media account during her detention, wrote: “As Ms Mufti’s illegal detention finally comes to an end, I'd like to thank everybody who supported me in these tough times. I owe a debt of gratitude to you all. This is Iltija signing off.”