Separatists held before press meet

Had planned to issue formal poll boycott call; released after few hours

The J&K police on Thursday took three key separatist leaders into custody ahead of a press conference at which they had planned to issue a formal call for the boycott of byelections for the two Lok Sabha seats scheduled to be held next month and also the planned local body polls.

The seats — Srinagar and Anantnag — fell vacant due to the resignation of sitting members of the ruling PDP, including its president Mehbooba Mufti. While Ms Mufti who was elected from home constituency Anantnag in the 2014 elections quit her Lok Sabha seat to fulfil the constitutional obligation following her appointment as chief minister, her party

colleague Tariq Hameed Karra resigned from both the PDP and Parliament in protest against its forging an alliance with ideologically-divergent BJP to form a coalition government in the state.

The separatist leaders — Syed Ali Shah Geelani, Mirwaiz Umar Farooq and Muhammad Yasin Malik — had planned to hold a meeting at Mr Geelani’s residence-cumoffice in Srinagar’s Hyderpora area, but the police did not allow it. After holding a brief protest sitin, the separatist leaders tried to address the media persons, but the police came in their way. After detaining the trio at a nearby police station for a couple of hours, the police escorted them back to their respective residences.

Photojournalists and other mediapersons covering the police action against the separatist leaders were thrashed by cops. A photograph showing AFP’s lensman Tauseef Mustafa being grabbed by the throat by a policeman has gone viral on social media sites.

Later the photojournalists were joined by other media persons to hold a protest.