Umar hits back at Omar

Jammu and Kashmir chief minister Omar Abdullah and moderate Hurriyat chairman Mirwaiz Umar Farooq are playing a mud-slinging match.

It all began with Omar accusing Mirwaiz of giving in to pressure from militants and calling for a poll boycott in Kashmir. “Separatists should realise that people have defied their boycott call and cast their votes,” he said.

Omar’s remarks did not go down well with Mirwaiz who hit back after Friday’s prayers at Jama Masjid. “We are always with the people. We don’t escape to London when our people are in crisis,” he said, referring to the time when Omar’s father Farooq Abdullah left Kashmir at the onset of militancy in 1990.

Thousands of people had gathered at Jama Masjid to offer prayers after several days of undeclared curfew. Mirwaiz had called for a boycott of the curfew if authorities did not allow people to offer prayers in the mosque. Feeling the heat, the authorities did not impose restrictions on Friday.

Mirwaiz advised Omar to read history books and find out how the latter’s party, National Conference, traded people’s sacrifices for power. “I would like to remind them that it is they who have made a U-turn. Our’s is a party which since 1931 (first under the leadership of Moulvi Yousuf Shah and later under Mirwaiz Farooq), worked for the people of Kashmir,” he said.

Mirwaiz said the Hurriyat would continue its struggle till the ultimate goal of freedom was achieved.