Yasin Malik says will leave politics if govt can prove it gave him security

SRINAGAR: Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF) chief and one of the Joint Resistance Leadership (JRL) trio, Muhammad Yasin Malik, on Thursday challenged the government to show a single instance when he either asked for government security or was provided it by the government.
“I will quit resistance politics for life if government can prove it,” he told reporters at a press conference here.
Malik issued his challenge after his name figured in the list of resistance leaders whose security cover had been removed on the directions of Indian Home Minister Rajanath Singh in response to the Pulwama fidayeen attack. Nearly 50 CRPF troops were killed in the attack which was the deadliest in terms of casualties in the 30-year-old armed insurgency in Kashmir.
Yasin said that in fact, the government itself had offered him security at least four times since he gave up armed struggle in the mid-1990s. He said he gave the government in writing that he did not require any security, and will himself be responsible for its consequence.
“I was offered security for the first time in 1996. I refused. Then I was offered it again when the uncle of Mirwaiz Umer Farooq was killed by unidentified gunmen. The third time was when the religious scholar Molana Showat was killed. The fourth time was when Fazlul Haq Qurashi was attacked,” he said.
“I refused each time. I would never ask for nor agree to having government security. In fact, one top police officer even told me that security has been provided to me by the government, without my asking. I refused to have it. I was asked to give in writing that I will be responsible for my self. I did that, too. Yet the government claims to have removed my security,” Yasin said.
The government had also included the name of Syed Ali Geelani in its list, but he, too, was never provided any security any by government. Mirwaiz Umer Farooq has also said that the government provided him security despite his refusal, after his father was assassinated.