Srinagar: Jammu and Kashmir National Conference on Friday expressed dismay over government of India’s decision of banning Jamaat-e-Islami in Jammu and Kashmir saying suppression breeds radicalization.

Party General Secretary Ali Muhammad Sagar while expressing disappointment over the ban said, “By ideologies we mean a specific mind set. It has be tackled by arguments. By banning JeI, the government will achieve nothing but giving it a dissident glamour. The move will not help; it will rather impede the process of reconciliation and rapprochement in our state.”

Sagar said that it does not augur well for a working democracy like ours to ban socio-political outfits. “By mounting heresy hunting against all who veer from the mainstream, GoI is wittingly closing the space for political dissent,” he said.

Sagar while underscoring the importance of dissent said, “The government could have used a platform of arguments in dealing with the dissent.  Suppression will inevitably breed radicalization,” he said adding, “I urge the GOI to undo the move of banning JeI in the state in the greater good of the country.”

“Banning political organizations do not behoove a democratic country like India. If there are any law and order problems that the state anticipates, then J&K police is already laced with enough legal framework to deal with,” he said adding, “The situation in our state is already grim and such measures will inadvertently hamper peace process in the state.”

This post was published on March 2, 2019