Rakib Altaf
SRINAGAR: Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah has broken his silence over the killing of two youths by the army in Sumbal.
In a statement issued nearly 40 hours after the incident, Omar has expressed his grief and called the killings “gruesome, eminently avoidable and needless”.
He says “My heart beats with the grief stricken hearts of the bereaved families.”
“If I could bring back Tariq and Irfan, I would leave no stone unturned to do so. But alas no human being has that power.”
The statement is being seen as too verbose, signifying nothing.
A Twitter user, Mohammed Ayoub has remarked “Army killings ‘gruesome’ says CM. We already know that, Anything else to say?”
Perhaps Omar himself is conscious of this when he says “My words are not meant as rhetoric to heal wounds that will never get healed.”
He says such incidents “lengthen the symbolic shortening of the emotional distance made possible by the railway tunnel between Kashmiris and the country.”
Omar has not even once in his statement mentioned the Army who killed the two youths nor has he referred to AFSPA (Armed Forces Special Powers Act) which gives immunity to the soldiers against prosecution.
He says “those who dare to challenge this right (right to life) by omission or commission are made to pay a price, the kind that serves as a cautionary example to others.”
Whether this is his promise or simply a wish is not clear.
However, Omar says that “the unwarranted deaths of Irfan and Tariq have hardened my resolve and determination to make the state of Jammu and Kashmir into an example where life is sacred and the right to life is protected by the law.”
Omar had earlier drawn flak for his long silence over the Sumbal killings.
Many Twitter users reminded that he had been very quick to comment on the killing of eight soldiers by militants a week ago calling them a “cowardly act”.
They cursed him for choosing not to tweet at all on the killing of civilians by the Army.
