A separatist separated from his people: An interview with Syed Ali Shah Geelani

Syed Ali Shah Geelani has problems with both of his eyes, one of his kidneys has been removed and the other has been reduced a quarter by a surgeon’s knife. His gall bladder has also been taken out. A pacemaker on his heart was replaced a couple of years ago. He is 81 years old and for much of his life, this hardcore separatist leader has been fighting for Kashmir’s independence from India. In the Kashmir valley his influence remains powerful, perhaps pervasive, and his supporters easily equal those who might wish the old man finally succumbed to one of his many ailments.

Geelani is currently in Delhi. He came from Srinagar for yet more medical treatment and was supposed to have returned two days ago. But Geelani and his supporters claim he has been prevented from leaving the city by the Delhi police who want to question him either over alleged money laundering allegations or, depending on what you read, supposedly seditious remarks he made at a rally last year in the capital. Mr Geelani said the police had not told him why he was unable to leave and had not yet approached him for a statement. [The Delhi police have only said they want to take a statement from him while the state's chief minister, Omar Abdullah, said in a Twitter message that the police wanted to take a statement regarding an alleged money laundering case. He said Geelani would then be free to leave.]

As it happens, Geelani is staying at a modest second floor apartment in a Muslim neigbhourhood, located close to a Mughal era mosque, less than quarter of an hour from my flat in south Delhi. I made arrangements to go and see him and, after some difficulty, found his address in a side lane of a narrow street. A friendly plain clothes policeman was sitting downstairs, noting down the names of visitors in a large book.

Geelani was wearing a woollen hat, with which he is rarely seen without, and sitting in a bedroom-cum-office going through some papers. When I asked him whether his apparent detention in the city was an attempt to pressurise him to join negotiations with the government, he answered: “They are pressuring me. They are using inhuman, immoral tactics to try and force us to bow and not to raise the voices of the suppressed.” He then referred to himself in the third person, adding: ”Particularlly, they are pressuring Geelani, his party and the forum of which he is president.”

Geelani and his All Parties Hurriyat Conference have refused to meet government-appointed interlocutors, tasked with trying to create dialogue between the various factions involved in the decades-old dispute over Kashmir. He said that last summer his organisation had handed a five-point demand to the government which is said had to be met before it would enter talks. The demands – the acceptance that Kashmir is “disputed”, the ending of draconian laws, the withdrawal of troops, the prosecution of those responsible for the deaths of up to 113 protesters last summer and the release of “political” prisoners – had not been met, and so there was no point meeting the interlocutors. “We are ready for dialogue but these points have to be accepted,” he told me.

Geelani has always insisted he supports only peaceful protests, despite many allegations over the years that he was linked to armed militants funded and trained by Pakistan. What is not doubted, is that it is Geelani who is responsible for calling the shutdowns or hartals, that regularly bring Srinagar and other towns and villages to a halt. Many people object to the way trade and normal life is choked off, but few feel able to stand up to the separatist leader and his allies in the Jamaat-e-Islami. I asked him whether he thought it was fair to repeatedly call ordinary people out onto the streets, knowing the hardship it caused them when they were unable to go to work or send their children to school. Just yesterday there was a strike, called in response to his detention in Delhi.

He replied: “This is a reaction to state terrorism by the government. The people have shown their resentment of the behaviour of the Delhi police. I called the strike; there is no choice, no option for the people to show their resentment.”

A young woman brought tea and biscuits. Mr Geelani said that a total of 4,294 people had been arrested in recent months under the Jammu and Kashmir Public Safety Act – “a draconian law” – and sent to jail. He claimed suspects from the Kashmir valley, some aged just 14 or 15, were being held in jails in Jammu where they faced abuse from the prison authorities. “Can you imagine the misery and suffering of their relatives,” he asked. He described the state’s youthful chief minister, Omar Abdullah, as a “toothless tiger” and questioned his good intentions, saying: “If you’re in charge and you allow police killing how can you have good intentions.”

There has been much speculation in the last year or so about possible power struggles within the Hurriyat and about the ambitions of potential rivals such as Ghulam Muhammad Bhat, a Hurriyat member whose arrest last month apparently triggered the police’s desire to question Geelani. Geelani looked physically weary when I spoke with him but he vowed his struggle would continue. He even revealed that he has completed an autobiography that he hopes to bring out next month. He said: “We have to carry on.”

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