[Reader-list] I’m not Indian, says Bar Prez

[A.K. Malik]

Dear Durani Ji,
               If the fellow doesn't believe in Constitution of India, what he is doing as a witness in a Court of Law established by the Constitution of India? There is a limit to the ''Natakbaazis'.
Regards,

(A.K.MALIK)


--- On Thu, 4/8/10, Pawan Durani <pawan.durani at gmail.com> wrote:

> From: Pawan Durani <pawan.durani at gmail.com>
> Subject: [Reader-list] I’m not Indian, says Bar Prez
> To: "reader-list" <reader-list at sarai.net>
> Date: Thursday, April 8, 2010, 9:33 AM
> http://www.risingkashmir.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=22289&Itemid=1
> 
> After Abdullah and Nazir, Qayoom dares Delhi in court
> 
> Ishfaq Tantry
> Srinagar, April 07: In an unprecedented development,
> J&K Bar
> Association President Wednesday made an open statement
> before the High
> Court (HC) saying “he isn’t an Indian citizen and
> doesn’t believe in
> the constitution of India”.
> 
> 
> Qayoom made this statement while being cross examined in
> the case
> relating to contempt of HC orders by the Kotbalwal Jail
> authorities,
> which today came up before Justice Muhammad Yaqoob Mir.
> 
> On January 9, Bar Association had filed a contempt petition
> 426/2010
> against Kotbalwal Jail SP and DSP “for violating HC
> orders dated
> January 1 by disallowing a four-member Bar team to meet the
> jail
> inmates on 7 January 2010.
> 
> Subsequently, the Bar had decided to lead six witnesses
> against the SP
> and DSP to prove their contempt case. In the first step
> towards that,
> Qayoom deposed before the HC on Tuesday as one of the
> witnesses of the
> Bar.
> 
> Today, during cross examination in the post lunch session,
> Advocate
> Sheikh Shakeel and Advocate Syed Tasaduq Khawaja, the
> counsel for the
> contemnors, Kotbalwal Jail SP Mirza Saleem Beg and DySP R S
> Jamwal
> asked Bar president Qayoom a specific question.
> 
> “Do you believe yourself to be a citizen of India?”
> 
> Qayoom replied: “No. I’m not a citizen of India. I’m
> a resident of
> Jammu and Kashmir.”
> 
> The defense counsel then asked, “Do you have faith in the
> Constitution
> of India?” to which the Bar President replied: “No
> I’ve no faith in
> the Indian constitution. You’ve yourself eroded the
> Indian
> constitution in J&K.”
> 
> As Qayoom was making this statement before the court, which
> was being
> simultaneously recorded, one of his colleagues asked him to
> reconsider
> this part of the statement but Qayoom did not stop and
> continued.
> 
> “I’m not afraid. If they put me behind bars for this,
> let them do it.
> Let it come on record.”
> 
> Though in the recent history there is no such precedent
> wherein in a
> prominent Kashmiri has openly declared himself not an
> Indian citizen,
> one such move was made by former Prime Minister of J&K
> Sheikh Muhammad
> Abdullah in 1960s when he embarked on the Hajj pilgrimage.
> 
> “In 1964, when Sheikh Abdullah decided to proceed for
> Hajj, he
> declared he wants his passport issued as a Kashmiri
> national not as an
> Indian citizen. In fact, later on he was issued one such
> passport by
> the authorities but the issued then rocked the Indian
> Parliament,”
> said Dr Sheikh Showkat Hussain, a noted Kashmiri
> commentator who
> teaches Law at the University of Kashmir. “Specifically,
> I don’t
> remember any such move in the recent times wherein a
> statement to this
> effect has been made in the open court.”
> 
> About the legal ramifications of such a statement by the
> Bar
> president, Prof Showkat said: “If we go by the definition
> of the Union
> of India, at many places, the territory has been defined as
> whole of
> India except the state of J&K.”
> 
> He said: “There is a general tendency among the Kashmiris
> to portray
> themselves as Kashmiri nationals rather than Indian
> citizens.”
> 
> In May 2008, National Conference president Omar Abdullah
> wrote in his
> blog about his uncle, who, because of his opposition to
> Kashmir’s
> accession to India, has always refused to be associated
> with anything
> “Indian”.
> 
> According to NC insiders, the uncle Omar was referring to
> was Sheikh Nazir.
> 
> “I’ve an uncle who more often than not I disagree with
> but I admire
> the conviction he has — he disagrees with what happened
> in 1947 and
> subsequent events and so refuses to carry a passport,”
> Chief Minister
> Omar Abdullah blogged in 2008.
> 
> “He has never applied for one. For the longest time he
> never left the
> State and only travelled by road between Srinagar and Jammu
> because he
> refused to travel on ‘Indian’ Airlines.”
> 
> Sheikh Nazir, 70, General Secretary of the National
> Conference is the
> nephew of National Conference leader Sheikh Abdullah and
> was raised by
> him as his son.
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