By Naeem Khan Niazi
LAHORE, Feb 05 (APP): Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IIOJK) has been looking for a messiah for over seven decades to win it freedom from the clutches of the Indian government.
The Indian government had assured the United Nations (UN) in 1948 to resolve the issue as per aspirations of the people of Jammu and Kashmir and resolutions of the UN Security Council (UNSC) but it never did so.
Rather the despotic Indian government established a barbarian rule in the occupied Kashmir to kill every voice for freedom.
The ruthless force and inhuman treatment of men, women and children have not stopped them from raising standard of freedom. Over the years, Kashmiri freedom leaders like Yasin Malik, Syed Ali Shah Geelani, Aasia Andrabi and Shabbir Shah have been jailed unlawfully while a barrage of brutalities has been unleashed against innocent Kashmiri Muslims to quell the innate passion of liberation but the state oppression has failed to extinguish the flame of freedom from the hearts, minds and souls of the Kashmiris.
Though India was bent upon rendering Kashmir freedom movement leaderless by incarcerating freedom fighters but Kashmiri people had kept the movement alive.
One of such people is Mushaal Hussein Mullick, wife of Hurriyat leader Yasin Malik- detained in Tihar jail by the Indian government, who, following in the foot-steps of her freedom fighter husband, has kept the peaceful struggle for the liberation of Kashmir active.
Mushaal Mullick represents the common Kashmiri women who have been forced to live without their families due to state oppression.
Thousands of Kashmiri women have been widowed or their husbands have been missing for their sin of dreaming of living of a free land. The children have been orphaned by the Indian forces or living lives in fear of never seeing them again. In her case, Mushaal’s husband, Hurriyat leader Yasin Malik, has been arrested by the Indian forces and she has been moving from pillar to post to win him freedom but to no avail.
Mushaal Mullick married Yasin Malik in 2009 and is mother to a daughter Raziya Sultana – a typical Kashmiri daughter who has been deprived to play in the lap of her father – and both mother and daughter have been fighting for the Kashmiri people who have been deprived their right to self-determination.
Mushaal Hussein Mullick has kept the torch of Kashmir freedom alight in the absence of her husband and other Kashmir leaders.
Through her organization, ‘Peace & Culture’ she has been instrumental in keeping the world abreast of the happenings in the occupied Kashmir and has been successful in exposing the brutalities of the Indian paramilitary forces against the hapless Kahsmiri freedom fighters.
Mushaal Mullick has written to the UN Secretary General for multiple occasions for the safety of her husband and freedom of Kashmir. She has been in constant contact with the United Nations Human Rights Commission (UNHRC) and other world bodies and highlighted the sorry plight of Kashmiri women who have been raped and abducted besides the children and the youth maimed by the Indian armed forces.
Mushaal has made the world realize that resolution of Kashmir issue was vital for the peace in the region as Kashmir is a nuclear flashpoint between Pakistan and India.
Mushaal’s main achievement has been her success in mobilizing the youth in the country and abroad. She has traveled length and breadth of the country and interacted with the students in educational institutions.
Speaking at a recent seminar in connection with Kashmir Solidarity Day by a school in Lahore, she urged the youth to use social media tools as a peaceful weapon to highlight sorry plight of Kashmiri people who have been suffering under the Indian yoke in the IIOJK with countless stories for girls like Hiba and who sacrificed their lives for freedom.
Mushaal Mullick recalls the main protagonist Juno in Irish playwright Sean O’Casey’s play ‘Juno and the Paycock’ which is set in the backdrop of war of independence in Ireland and depicts women as true fighters and pillar of strength in the backdrop of Irish freedom struggle. Juno bore the burden of her household in the absence of male members who were missing due to state oppression, disability, death or participation in the freedom struggle.
Apart from the parallels between the Irish and Kashmiri freedom struggle, the world must act before it is too late to avert the humanitarian crisis in Kashmir or poke the region into a war.
In her message on the occasion of Kashmir Solidarity Day – a day observed all over the globe to express solidarity with Kashmiri people in IIOJK -, she urged the world powers to stand by the Kashmiris and help them win their right to freedom.
