National Conference (NC) president Dr. Farooq Abdullah and vice-president Omar Abdullah on Monday filed a habeas corpus petition before the High Court (HC), challenging “the unconstitutional and illegal house detention of 16 NC senior leaders and functionaries”.
“The decision to move to the court has been taken as a last resort to provide relief to various party members who have continuously been under house arrest or were kept under house detention after being shifted there from detention centers”, NC spokesman Imran Nabi Dar said.
He described the shifting of the NC detainees from detention centres to their homes “only characterised revolving-door detention practice”.
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“Quashing of the Public Safety Act of NC general secretary Ali Muhammad Sagar underscored the indefensible nature of all detentions in the court of law, leading us to believe that the administration will release all the detainees in the absence of any convincing reason behind it. Unfortunately that was not to be. The house detentions without any administrative orders are unlawful, undermining due respect to human rights and individual liberty”, Mr. Dar said.
The NC was hopeful that the court would come to the rescue of those colleagues who have been suffering for no fault, ever since the abrogation of provisions of Article 370, Article 35A on August 05, 2019.
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Dr. Abdullah has filed a petition for the release of Ali Mohammad Sagar, Abdul Rahim Rather, Nasir Aslam Wani, Aga Syed Mehmood, Mohammad Khalil Bandh, Irfan Shah and Sahmeema Firdous from ‘illegal’ house detention.
Mr. Omar Abdullah, in his petition, has challenged the detention of Mohammad Shafi Uri, Aga Syed Ruhullah Mehdi, Chaudhary Mohammad Ramzaan, Mubarak Gul, Dr. Bashir Veeri, Abdul Majeed Larmi, Basharat Bukhari, Saifudin Bhat Shutru, Mohammad Shafi through their counsel Adv Shariq Reyaz.
Most of the NC leaders were either taken into custody or placed under house arrest since August last. Dr. Abdullah and Mr. Omar, also booked under the PSA, were released by March this year.
